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Half a snarl rose in Miki's throat, but in that moment Challoner had put his arm around Nanette too, and Nanette's arms were about him and the baby, and she was sobbing something which for the life of him Miki could make neither head nor tail of. And yet he knew that he must not snarl or spring. He felt the wonder-thrill of the new thing that had come into the cabin; he gulped hard, and looked.
Events had come to pass so swiftly and so vividly in Miki's life during the past twenty-four hours that for many miles after they left Fort O' God his senses were in an unsettled state of anticipation. His brain was filled with a jumble of strange and thrilling pictures.
Miki's hair began to stand on end. He did not know that Kawook, like all his kind, was the best-natured fellow in the world, and had never harmed anything in his life unless assaulted first. Lacking this knowledge he set up a sudden frenzy of barking to warn Neewa. Neewa roused himself slowly, and when he opened his eyes he was looking into a spiky face that sent him into a convulsion of alarm.
Suddenly they came around the end of a point, and all of Fort O' God lay on the rising shelf of the shore ahead of them. The growl died in Miki's throat. His teeth shut with a last click. For an instant his heart seemed to grow dead and still. Until this moment his world had held only half a dozen human beings.
So, instead of lashing Miki to the sledge as Le Beau had fastened him to his improvised drag, Durant made his captive comfortable, covering him with a warm blanket before he began his journey eastward. He made sure, however, that there was no flaw in the muzzle about Miki's jaws, and that the free end of the chain to which he was still fastened was well hitched to the Gee-bar of his sledge.
His voice was one continuous bawl, and to this bass Miki's soprano wailing added the touch which would have convinced any passing Indian that the loup-garou devils were having a dance.
The light of day was dim and hazy before Miki's eyes, and he was beginning to swell from the tip of his nose to the end of his bony tail. Neewa, being so much fat, suffered less. He could still see, and, as the painful hours passed, a number of things were adjusting themselves in his brain. All this had begun with the man-beast. It was the man-beast who had taken his mother from him.
Since the days of his puppyhood with Challoner a smell like that which came from the meat had not filled Miki's nostrils, and at last Durant saw him lick his chops and heard the click of his teeth. He chuckled in his beard. Still he waited another quarter of an hour. Then he pulled the meat off the spit, cut it up, and gave a half of it to Miki. And Miki ate it ravenously.
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