Part 23 (1/2)
The teacher at school had told the boys never to touch the sailors'
liquor. The teacher said it would steal the boys' souls. Anvik did not understand that very well, but he knew liquor made Tanana and their father cross and lazy, and the laziness kept them poor, and the mother was sad.
Anvik lay long awake that night, on the raised platform of snow in the igloo, and thought.
”My teacher said he heard that at one Eskimo village a canoe came with whisky and the Eskimos pounded on a drum all night, and shouted,” thought the lad. ”When the morning came, the people were ashamed to look in the face of their teacher. My teacher said I must pray the dear Lord Christ to save Tanana and my father from drinking.”
And Anvik prayed in the dark igloo.
The next day came, and Anvik went again to school, but Tanana and the father went off to look at the ice-traps wherein Eskimos catch any stray wolves or foxes.
When Anvik came back at night to the igloo, he met his father and Tanana rejoicing over a bear cub that they had killed. They were bringing it home with them, and were laughing, and shouting, and singing, not so much from joy as from drinking together from the bottle that Tanana had procured.
”We have a bear cub, a bear cub!” shouted Tanana in maudlin tones to his brother. ”See how strong the hot water we drink makes us! We come home with a bear cub! Hot water, let us drink hot water!”
Now by ”hot water” Tanana meant of course the liquor in his bottle, and when Anvik saw the young bear and the condition his father and brother were in, the lad immediately became very anxious, for the Eskimos are usually very careful not to kill a young bear without having first killed its mother. It is considered a very rash thing to kill the cub first, and when men who are pressed by hunger do it, they are obliged to exercise the strictest precaution lest they should be attacked by the mother-bear, for she will surely follow on the track of the men.
So the Eskimos usually go in a straight line for about five or six miles, and then suddenly turn off at a right angle, so that the mother-bear, as she presses eagerly forward, may overrun the hunters' track and lose her way. The men go on a distance, and then turn as before.
After doing this several times, the men dare to go home, but even there weapons are placed ready for use by the bedside, and outside the house sledges are put up right, for the bear is always suspicious of the erect sledge, and she will knock it dawn before she will attack the igloo. The knocking down of the sledge makes a noise that gives warning to the family.
But when Anvik saw the condition that his father and brother were in, he was greatly frightened, for he did not believe that the liquor had left enough sense in their minds so that they had remembered to turn off in the homeward journey, and, if they had come home without covering their track, there could be no doubt that the mother bear would come to attack the igloo that very night.
But it would do no good to say anything to Tanana and his father.
They were far too much under the influence of what they had been drinking. Anvik told his mother his suspicions.
”We will set up the sledge outside the igloo,” said his mother, trembling.
”I will have my harpoon ready,” answered Anvik bravely. ”Do not fear, mother. Perhaps the bear will not come.”
They put two harpoons and a spear beside the raised platform of snow in the igloo, after the father and older son were stupidly sleeping.
Then came an anxious time of waiting. The stone lamp's light grew more and more dim to Anvik's drowsy eyes, as he, too, lay on one side of the circular platform. Nothing disturbed his father and brother in their heavy, liquor-made sleep. Anvik's eyes closed at last, even while he was determined to keep awake. His mother, tired with sc.r.a.ping and pounding skins, nestled her chubby baby in her neck, and dropped asleep; too, after long watching. The igloo was quiet, except for the heavy breathing.
A terrible noise arose outdoors. Anvik started into consciousness.