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"With a feed," replied Okiok, glancing slyly at his better half. "As if I didn't know that!" returned the wife. "When did Okiok ever do anything before having his morning feed?" "When he was starving," retorted the husband promptly. This pleasantry was received with a giggle by the women. "Well, father, and what comes after the morning feed?" asked Nunaga. "Kick-ball," answered Okiok.
Rooney laughed. "Well, you know best," he said; "I daresay you are right. Okiok is a sharp fellow, and Ujarak is but a blundering booby after " A low chuckle in the region of the lamp attracted their attention at this point.
Observing the fresh skin in a corner, and one or two ribs, he bolted the bite, and said "O yes. My torngak is kind; he tells me many things without being asked. He said to me two days ago, `Okiok is a clever man. Though all the people are starving just now, he has killed a seal and a bear." "Can torngaks make mistakes?" asked Okiok, with a puzzled look.
Having uttered this truism, he thrust the blubber well home, and continued his meal. Nuna's curiosity, having been aroused, was not easily allayed. She sat down beside her spouse, and plied him with numerous questions, to which Okiok gave her brief and very tantalising replies until he was gorged, when, throwing down the platter, he turned abruptly to his wife, and said impressively
He chanced to be standing beside a mass of turf which Okiok had cut from the ground for the purpose of making a dry seat for Nuna. Seizing this, Ippegoo hurled it at the head of the drunken Eskimo. Never before did the feeble youth make such a good shot. Full on the flat face of the drunkard it went, like the wad of a siege-gun, scattering earth and debris all round and down went the Eskimo.
Okiok did indeed suggest that Norrak and Ippegoo, being both possessed of hard and prominent noses, might rub these organs together till they caught fire; but Norrak turned up his nose at the suggestion, and Ippegoo shook his head doubtfully.
"Is he doing that curious thing," asked Okiok in a low voice, "which you once told me about smookin' tibooko?" "Yes; that's it," replied Rooney with a broad grin, "only you had better say `smokin' tobacco' next time." "`Smokkin' tibucco," repeated the Eskimo; "well, that is funny. But why does he spit it out? Does he not like it?" "Of course he likes it.
"Hah! how strong I feel," he said, "a white bear would be but a baby in my hands!" Going through a similar stretch-yawny process, his brother Norrak said that he felt as if he had strength to turn a walrus inside out. "Come, boys, turn yourselves out o' the house, and help to cut up the meat. It is not wise to boast in the morning," said Okiok.
He made no further attempt to resist, but, as a precaution, his hands were again tied, and then he was left to dry in the sun, and to his meditations, while the party made the traverse of the bay. This was accomplished in three trips. As the last party was about to start, Okiok and Kajo alone remained on the shore. "You had better think twice," said Rooney, as he was about to push off the boat.
The Eskimo word Nunaga signifies "my land," and was bestowed by Okiok on his eldest-born in a flood of tenderness at her birth. Apologising for this philological digression, we proceed.
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