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Updated: June 12, 2025
Steve and his Indians had returned again to the reality of things. Steve drew a deep breath. "We can't make another yard with the dogs," he said. "The snow's gone. It's gone for keeps." It was a simple statement of the facts. And Oolak and Julyman were equally alive to them. "Then him all mak' back?" There was eagerness in Julyman's question.
Something of Oolak's awe found reflection in the eyes of Julyman. He, too, was an easy prey to the other's primitive superstition. Steve alone seemed untroubled. He understood these men. They were comrades on the trail. There was no distinction. There was no master and servant here. They fought the battle together, the Indians only looking to him for leadership.
He had no desire to hurt him. But Steve knew that the man had been saying what he had said for his benefit. "You're a damn scoundrel, Julyman," he said, and there was less than the usual tolerance in his tone. The Indian shrugged under his furs. "Julyman wise man," he protested. "All the time white man say, 'one squaw. It good! So! It fine! Indian man say one two five ten squaw.
A western wind in these latitudes was little less terrible than when it blew from the north. It had over three thousand miles of snow and ice to reduce its temperature. Steve's voice again came in the howl of the wind. "Guess we'll get back to the fire," he said decisively. Julyman needed no second bidding; he turned and moved away.
He dropped it into the bowl of his pipe. Then, after a deep inhalation or two, he knocked it out again. "'Hibernate' eh? That's how we call it," he said presently. Then he shook his head. The smile had passed out of his eyes. "No. It's a dandy notion. But it's not true. They'd starve plumb to death. You see, Julyman, they're human folks the same as we are."
Steve nodded. His eyes were very tender, and their smile was the smile he always held for the boy who had now become a man. "It'll be fall early fall. We can't start out too early, but it mustn't be till the dopers are asleep. You see, we've got to leave An-ina behind without a soul to protect her." "Yes." Marcel's happy eyes shadowed. But they brightened at once. "Couldn't we leave Julyman?
Us goes," the child cried, with a sudden enthusiasm. "Us finds all the lakes, an' rivers, an' forests, an' wolves, an' bears, an' the little dear. Boy likes 'em. Us goes now?" The headlong nature of the demand set Steve smiling. "Well, I guess we can't go till winter quits," he said. "We'll need to wait awhile till it's not dark any more. Then we'll take An-ina. And Julyman. And Oolak.
He knew his boss was thinking of his own white squaw and the pretty blue eyes of the pappoose which made the father forget every trouble and concern when he gazed down into them. Oh, yes, Julyman understood. He understood pretty well every mood of his boss. And who should understand them if he did not? Men on the trail together learn to read each other like a book.
He had no more reason to believe the story of "hibernating" Indians than he had for believing the hundred and one stories of Indian folklore he had listened to in his time. Julyman, too, considered the subject closed. He had said all he had to say. So the spasm of talk was swallowed up by the silence of the summer night.
Instead he spat again into the fire and gave himself up to a luxurious hate of Hervey Garstaing, the Indian Agent, whom all Indians hated. Julyman was only a shade removed from his original savagery. There were times when he was not removed from savagery at all. This was such a moment.
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