 CHAPTERS 14 AND 15 OF SHASTA OF THE WOLF'S by OLOF BAKER. THIS LIBERVOX RECORDING IS IN THE PUBLIC DOMAIN. SHASTA LEAVES HIS WOLF KIN. THE DAYS AND WEEKS WENT BY. By the time the dark blue flower of the canvas had faded, and the yellow wild parsley had begun to look tired, Shasta began to feel again the same strange restlessness creeping over him which he had felt before. And whenever he turned his face towards the southeast, the remembrance of the Indian village would sit down thickly upon him and he would stop to think. When he remembered the rawhide lariat and the husky dogs, he hated the camp. But when he remembered with his nose memory, the pleasant odor of the burning cottonwood and of the dried sweet grass came to him and made a stirring in his heart. Moreover, the Indian smell was there, the smell that does not come from cottonwood nor sweet grass, or parfletches filled with buffalo meat, but clings about even the Indian names and is an odor of the old forgotten times. As he went along the trails, somehow or other everything was different. The birds were there just the same. The blue jays were full of jabbering talk. The crows followed each other from tree to tree, always crying to those ahead to go farther on and fasten their food bags to another bow. And the woodpecker hammered hollowly at the hidden heart of the woods. As with the birds, so with the beasts. Nitka and Shumu went and came on the hunting trails and the wolf brothers howled in the night. Gomposh slapped the dead logs for grubs and was a silly old bear when nobody was watching. But when he met any one he would sit down heavily at once and look dreadfully wise. And the weasels went on their wicked ways, killing and killing, not because of hunger, but the bloodlust to kill. And the red squirrels and the gray squirrels ran along the treetops for miles without ever coming to the ground, and the fussy little chipmunks fussed. In spite of all this Shasta felt that something had changed and that nothing could ever be quite the same again. And although the wolves brought him just as much meat as before, so that he never went hungry, he kept longing for the taste of the buffalo tongue which the Indian women had thrown to him out of the smoking pot. The wolves never brought him anything so good as that. It made his mouth water when every thought of that delicious thing. So he wandered up and down, up and down, more and more restless, and difficult to satisfy. It was not that he was unhappy. Sometimes even he was wildly happy, running and leaping in the sun, or swinging on a fur branch and talking wolf talk to himself. At such times the sunlight and the sweet mountain air seemed to have got into his blood, and the blue sky did not seem blue enough or the moss green enough, or the bark lush big enough to be equal to his joy. It was the life that was in him which could not contain itself in its body and kept overflowing the hybrim of his heart. Yet the creatures and their ways did not wholly satisfy him. That was the mischief of it. There were other creatures and other ways. He had seen those other creatures and he could not forget. He did not know that they were his own people, and that the drawing which he felt towards them was blood, and not cooked buffalo tongue. When his thoughts ran that way, it was the remembrance of the smell and the taste of the new life that was strongest. Even the memory of the lariat and the huskies could not overcome that. And as Miko, the red squirrel, was always running along the green roof of the world, chickering and making mischief, and egging folks on to fight, so along the roof of Shasta's mind the new restlessness ran, and chickered and would not let him be. The morning came at last when he bowed his head and obeyed. He stood a long time at the mouth of the cave, looking over the familiar world of the forest and mountain, and the distant shining peaks. Far away to the south he saw a speck against the blue. It moved slowly as he watched. Something told him that it was Kennebec, sitting in the wind. Kennebec had been very quiet of late. Now that there were no eaglets to feed, there was not so much need to go cub and lamb snatching on the mountain slopes. Besides which, he avoided the barglash. It was there that the creature lived who had dared to scale his rocks. Henceforth the barglash became for Kennebec a place of danger, and he gave it a wide berth. Now, as Shasta gazed over the wide spaces below him, and up at the rocks above, he looked at them wistfully, as if he were saying good-bye. He didn't know anything about good-bye really, because the animals never consciously say farewell. They separate from each other because their feet take them, but it is mercifully hidden from them that sometimes they will not return. Something in him begged him to stay, to remain where he was and not mix himself up with the new, unexplained life that was busy among the foothills where there were lariots and husky dogs, and where the creatures walked on their hind legs. Here he knew the world and the ways of all its folk. From the shadowy inside of the cave to the glare of the sunlight on the shimmering peaks he was familiar with it all. It was built around his heart in a bigness that was home. But now, for some unexplained and mysterious reason, he was leaving it and going to this other, utterly different thing which had bound him and bitten him, and had given new smells to his nose and a new taste to his tongue. And he knew perfectly well that neither Nitko nor Shumu, nor any of the Wolf Brothers would wish him to go, just as clearly as if they all sat on their haunches in a row in front of him and implored him to remain. They were all away now, and he was alone at the den's mouth. But if they should come back before he started, he knew that he could not keep the thing a secret from their sharp understandings. They would lick him and rub noses, and look at him out of their wild, wonderful eyes, and say, We know, little person, and then the thing would be impossible, and he would not be able to go. In a moment he had run swiftly down the slope and was lost among the trees. The sun was setting when he reached the end of the canyon towards the Indian camp. He did not go by way of the Wolf Rocks this time. It was there that looking always had seized him, and he did not want to be caught like that again. So he climbed down the steep sides of the gorge which the Indians call Big Wolf Canyon, and crept out among the high clumps of bunch grass beside the stream. He could not see the village from here. It was well hidden by a swell of the ground. But though he could not see it, he caught the sounds and the smells of it as they drifted down wind. Presently he picked up his courage and climbed to the top of the rising ground. Here the village was in full view. Soft blue trails of smoke were rising from the tops of the lodges, for the squaws were preparing the evening meal. The camp looked very peaceful, and not at all a thing to fill you with dread. Nevertheless Shasta eyed it suspiciously, as a thing full of unexpected dangers which yelped and had sharp teeth. Slowly he crept forward, crawling from tough to tough of grass, and taking advantage of every bit of rising ground, so that he might approach as close as possible without being seen. The things he was particularly on guard against were the Huskies. But as luck would have it, there was not a single dog on this side of the camp, so that he crept right up to the outer circle of lodges without any mishap. It was not till he had reached the inner circle of lodges and was crouching at the back of one of them that he was discovered. The one who made the discovery was no less a person than Running Laffing, the ten-year-old daughter of the Chief. She was carrying a buffalo bag to fetch water from the stream, and passed so close behind the teepee that she almost trod on Shasta before she saw him. She stood still in amazement, looking down at the strange thing at her feet. Shasta gazed at her in equal astonishment, but also with fear. By reason of his position on the ground, Running Laffing looked taller to him than she really was. He marveled at her appearance and the thing she seemed to have stuck on to her skin. It is true she only wore a soft-hand-buck-skin dress, trimmed with porcupine quills and deer bones, and had small white shells in her ears. But to Shasta's unaccustomed eyes it was a wonderful and very dreadful gear. As for him, he was just as he was, and was neatly dressed in his own skin, which was a reddish-brown under the fine hair. For some time they looked at each other without a sound or a movement. Then Running Laffing behaved like her name and told her father, Big Eagle, what she had found. Big Eagle was preparing for a religious service in the lodge of the Yellow Buffalo. When he heard that the wolf-child was again in the camp, he sent for looking always to tell him that his captive had returned. Looking always went at once with Running Laffing to where Shasta crouched beside the teepee. When he came there he did not attempt to touch Shasta, but he carried a rawhide lariat with him in case of need. He did something even wiser. He sent Running Laffing to find Shoshani, the medicine man, and tell him to come. So Running Laffing fetched Shoshani, and when he came he began to make medicine with his voice. Now, to make medicine with your voice is not an easy thing to do, and is only to be done by those who know the forest lore and prairie lore, and the secrets of the beasts. And Shoshani could do this, because he was cramped full of lore, and his head was bulging with buffalo wisdom and a knowledge of the beasts. As regards the beasts, he did not, of course, know as much as Shasta did, but he knew quite enough to make him wiser than the other Indians, and directly he began to talk. Shasta knew that he knew. It was a wonderful and strange medicine which Shoshani made, and if you understood the Indian tongue, you would have heard many beautiful and far away things. For the Indian medicine talk there are many and many words which come a long way from the north and a long way from the south, and very far indeed from the east and west. From the north they fall, as the feathers drop from the wings of wild geese, when they come honk honking in the deep nights. From the south they are of the buffalo where they wallow by the great lake whose waters never rest. From the east they are of coyotes, and from the west of the wolves. And many other sounds there are too, and words which make you think of the wind along the scarped edges of rocks, and of the rumble of avalanches as they fall thunderously, and of the whisper of the junipers when the air creeps. All the great wilderness seem to give itself in echoes along Shoshani's tongue. As Shasta listened, a peculiar feeling came upon him. The sound of Shoshani speaking affected him as nothing had done before. It seemed to rub him gently all over with a soothing touch. Deep within him something answered to it, and was pleased. His fear and distrust of the Indians melted away under the influence of the voice. The look of the wild animal in his eyes began to soften into something that was almost human. Shoshani saw the effect which the medicine was producing and went on. Gradually he began to move away from the teepee. As he did so, he walked backwards, keeping his eyes always fixed upon Shasta, and holding him with his gaze. Shasta looked straight into Shoshani's eyes. The eyes were like the voice. They drew him whether he wanted them to or no. Slowly, step by step, he left the teepee and began to follow the medicine man in his slow backward walk. Where he was going and why he was doing this he had no idea. Only the voice called him and the eyes drew him. He must follow those eyes and that voice wherever they chose to go. By degrees Shoshani moved into the center of the camp. Shasta followed him a few feet away. Not many paces off the lodge of the yellow buffalo was pitched. Insights at Big Eagle and his braves collected for the sacred ceremony. The ceremony had not yet begun because they were waiting for the medicine man to sing the opening words, without which the medicine of the buffaloes would not be complete. At last Shoshani entered the lodge, still walking backwards. In a moment or two Shasta followed. He saw the braves sitting on the ground with Big Eagle in the center. For the moment they were not saying or doing anything. There seemed to be a great number, for the teepee was full. Just in front of Big Eagle there burnt a small fire. After Shoshani and Shasta had entered and Shoshani had sat down, Big Eagle took an ember from the fire with the forked stick. He then put some dried sweet grass on it to burn. Soon the smoke of the burning grass filled the lodge with a pleasant smell. Shasta sniffed this new smell up his nose with the light. He watched the gray threads of smoke with wonder. He thought they must be the wings of the ember which waved in the air. Presently Big Eagle put his hands in the smoke and rubbed them all over his body. Shasta looked on in astonishment. To him, hands were for pause. He had never seen for pause do so much, or do it in so odd a way. When Big Eagle had rubbed himself all over with the sweet smoke, he took another ember and with it lit a large pipe. The pipe was of polished tone and red in color. Then Shasta saw what to him was the most surprising thing of all. When Big Eagle had put the red thing to his mouth, a wing came out and waved itself in the air. The pipe went from mouth to mouth, as the braves passed it round the lodge and from every mouth, as it went, gray wings sprouted and went wandering through the air. After the smoking was over, the ceremony began. Shasta heard Shoshani make many strange noises and let his voice run up and down as if he wanted to howl. It made Shasta want to howl too, but he remembered that he was not among the wolves now, and so he kept the feeling down. When Shoshani had finished, the other braves went on. They seemed to want to howl badly too. Shasta could not understand how they could make so many odd noises in their throats, and yet never throw their heads back for the long, sobbing note. On each side of Big Eagle were the squaws, Liloate and Sarvis, his two wives. They had rattles in their hands, and they beat them on a buffalo hide stretched upon the floor. The beating was in time to the chanting, and Shasta watched in wonderment at the rise and fall of the rattles, which, every time they touched the hide, gave out a sharp noise. Presently at a signal from Big Eagle, the rattling ceased. Shoshani rose. He advanced three paces toward Shasta. Then he stretched out his hand and laid it on his head. When Shasta felt the hand of Shoshani upon his head, the tingling feeling ran in his blood and made his flesh creep. Then Shoshani spoke. What he said Shasta could not understand, yet it seemed to him that, as he had once been admitted to the wolf pack as of its blood, now he was being received into the Indian pack as one of themselves. And he was right in his guess, for this was what Shoshani said. This is Shasta the wolf child. I have tamed him, because I understand the wolf medicine. But he is the wolf medicine. Because of that, he is stronger than I. There was a pause here, while the whole company gathered together in the teepee gazed at Shasta with awe. Presently Shoshani went on. Many moons ago, the Asiniboyns, as you know, attacked us when we were moving to the Sakuska River to pitch our summer camp. A squaw was killed, and her papoos carried off. The brave who did this was not an Asiniboyne. He was Red Fox, who stole the eagle medicine, and is a traitor to our tribe. Red Fox went to the Asiniboyns with lies upon his tongue. But the papoos which Red Fox carried off was the grandson of Fighting Bull, our old chief, who died soon afterwards. And his name was Shasta, which is one of our oldest names. Nothing was afterwards seen of the papoos in the lodges of the Asiniboyns. Why? I will tell you, because its father had been his deadly enemy. Red Fox gave it to the wolves. Shoshani suddenly ceased speaking, but his eyes glowed, and the echo of his voice seemed to run in the ears of the braves, as if his thought, which was fierce and strong, made itself a voice out of the silence. Chapter 15 How Shasta Fought Mushawank So that was how it came to pass that Shasta was received by the Indians into their tribe, and was called by his own name, which he had never known. The moons went by, and by degrees he left off his wolf ways and took on Indian ways instead. He learned to walk upright, to eat cooked food and to talk the Indian tongue. To learn the last took him a long time. At first he could only make wolf noises, and would growl when he was angry, bark when he was excited, and how when it was necessary to say things to the moon. But he had Shoshani for a teacher, and Shoshani's patience had no end. At first he was shy of the Indian boys, because they teased him when they had opportunity, and their elders backs were turned. But by degrees his shyness wore away, and he began to take part in their racing and riding. Soon he could ride and run races with the best of them. Also when it came to wrestling, they soon found that he was more than their match, for his life among the wolves had given an extraordinary strength to his muscles and suppleness to his body. It was in a fight with Mushawank that this quality of Shasta's body first made itself known. Mushawank was a bully, and one of the leaders of those who enjoyed teasing Shasta whenever they had a chance. So one day Mushawank and his companions came upon Shasta when he was sitting by himself amongst the bunch grass of the creek. At first, when Mushawank began to tease and probe him with a stick, Shasta pretended not to mind, and got up and walked away. Even when Mushawank followed and stabbed him again, he took it all in good part, and caught hold of the stick with a laugh. But Mushawank snatched the stick away with a vicious pull, and struck Shasta with it across the face. What followed came so quickly that those who watched held their breath in astonishment. The leap of a wolf is so swift that it must be seen to be believed. When Shasta leaped on the bully, the other boys saw something that seemed to hurl itself through the air, strike savagely and bound away. Mushawank, taken utterly by surprise, went down under the blow. He was on his feet again in an instant, but almost before he was up, Shasta had hurled himself upon him again. This time Mushawank ceased him before he could leap away, and both boys rolled over together. Mushawank was the heavier of the two. He had bigger bones and a more powerful body. If he could have held Shasta down, he would certainly have had the best of it. But to hold Shasta down was like sitting on a small volcano. There was a violent eruption of arms and legs, and Mushawank was lifted into the air. While he was still struggling to his feet, Shasta was on him again. It was the wolf in Shasta which urged him to these lightning attacks and counter attacks which made the eyes blink. Once the wild beast spirit in him was fully roused, nothing could stand against it. The wolf blood raced in his veins, the wolf light flashed in his eyes. There broke out of his throat fierce sounds which certainly were not human. As he fought, he seemed to himself be a wolf again, with the uncontrollable wolf fury raging in his heart. Yet it was not merely wild rage that was in him. At the back of his mind he knew that he was fighting for his freedom, for his self-respect. Once he allowed himself to be beaten by Mushawank, he knew that the other boys would have no mercy upon him. The time for gentleness and forbearance was gone by. The fight was none of his making. Mushawank had forced it upon him because he was a bully, and because he had judged Shasta to be a coward. The other boys stood round in a silent ring, watching the fight with glittering eyes. Their very silence showed how deeply they were moved, though end in like they gave no vent to their feeling by any outward sign. They were like a circle of animals, watching, with a fierce animal joy, a combat wage to the death, and presently a terror, as of death itself, came to Mushawank the bully, as he fought. He had thought that to conquer Shasta would be a very easy thing. He wanted to give him a good thrashing, see the blood-flow, and leave the wolf-boy half-dead at the finish. But he now knew, when too late, that he had wrought something which was not in his power to subdue. By his own folly and cruelty, he had drawn upon himself a vengeance which was not of men, but of the wolves. He ceased to take the offensive. All he wanted now was to defend himself as best he could against Shasta's lightning attacks. It was when he tried to hold Shasta that the marvelous elasticity of the wolf-boy's body showed itself. No matter how Mushawank bent this way and that, straining every muscle till the vein stood out on his throat, Shasta's firm flesh and wonderful sinews resisted every effort to break him into submission. He twirled himself into the most astonishing positions, upsetting Mushawank every time the bully seemed for a moment to have gained the upper hand. The fight finished as suddenly as it had begun. Mushawank had received so severe a punishing that at last he could bear it no longer. It was not his body alone that suffered. In his mind the terror was growing. It was a horrible feeling that what he fought was a boy outwardly only, and was in reality more than half a wolf. The sudden leap, the breakaway, the deadly leap again. This was how the wolves fought. It was not to be met in any familiar human way, taking advantage of a moment when Shasta seemed to pause. Mushawank turned and fled towards the camp. The other Indian boys looked on in astonishment at this ending to the fight. They would hardly believe their eyes that the big and masterful Mushawank should be defeated so utterly by the little wolf-boy that at last he should flee in terror. They gazed at Shasta, the vector in awe. Keeping a respectful distance for fear lest the wolf in him might turn suddenly upon them. It did not need Shasta's quick eyes to perceive this fear upon them. His mind caught it as it oozed, in spite of themselves into the air. Swift, as always, to act when his mind had once clearly seen a thing. He made a quick step forward, crouching as if to spring. To the alarmed Indian boys it seemed as if his whole body quivered with rage. In his crouching position it seemed to take on itself mysteriously the actual outlines of a wolf. Certainly the eyes between the long and shaggy locks of hair shot out a light that was not human, but of that deep, brute world, old and savage, in the thick layer of the trees. That was enough. Without waiting an instant longer the whole band broke asunder and took their heels in flight. Shasta watched their departure with a joyful triumph. Now at last he had proved that the wolf spirit in him was not to be broken, and that those who provoked or insulted it did so at their own peril. It was the upright free spirit of the wild. And as such it was a good spirit and belonged to the early freshness of the world. In Shasta it would not attack or injure things as long as they left him alone. But once his freedom or peace were threatened, then he would resist with all the strength in his power. When the last flying form had disappeared behind the rising ground, Shasta turned towards the trees. The excitement that was in him danced and bubbled in his blood. He was tired and sore in his body, but his heart was high. High as the tops of the spruces and the pines. He felt that he must go tell his heart to the trees. He went far into the forest and then sat down. The trees were all about him, close on every side. It was as if they were crowding up to him to hear what he had to say. The big silence of them did not make him lonely or afraid. They were solemn and yet companionable, and full of wise medicine, which he understood, but could not but could not put into speech. The end in camp was very far away now. Moshe Wonk and the others were little things that did not matter. It was the trees that mattered now, the trees and the wolves. Only his fine ear could have detected that soft footfall coming down the trail. And when he turned his eyes it did not surprise him that he looked straight into those of a big gray wolf. What Shasta said to the wolf and what the wolf said to Shasta cannot be set down in words. Though it was neither Nitka nor Shumu, it was a wolf-brother of the three seasons back, and the two recognized each other in some mysterious way. And so Shasta was able to learn all he wanted to know about the den upon the barglash, and how his foster parents fared. It was over nine months now since he had seen them, but according to the wolf-brother nothing was amiss. Upon the barglash everything went much as it had gone in the old days when Shasta was a little naked man-cub, and had no notion of wearing clothes. The wolf-brother did not approve of the clothing Shasta wore, though it was only a little tan buckskin tunic falling to the knee. For that was one of Shasta's peculiarities, that though he suffered the effort for part of his body to be clad, he would not allow them to interfere with the freedom of his legs. Moccasins he would only wear in winter, when the frost bit hard, or in the summer when he had to fit upon him to decorate his feet. Running laughing had made him the summer moccasins, and had embroidered them most cunningly with elk teeth and porcupine quills. Shasta walked stiffly, with a sense of grandeur, when he wore the summer moccasins, looking down at his feet as if they belonged to some great medicine-man or important chief. The wolf-brother sniffed at the tunic disprovingly. The inden smell of it upset him and made his hackles rise. So Shasta, to please him, took it off, and let him see that it was only a loose skin that did not matter, and could easily be thrown away. After that things went more smoothly, and they talked companionably together in the shadow of the trees. And when the evening light began to be golden about the tops of the spruces, and the forest to stir, and shake off the drowsy weight of the afternoon, the wolf-brother departed as suddenly and softly as he had come, and Shasta, having watched him go regretfully, turned homewards to the camp. End of CHAPTERS XIV and XV CHAPTER XVI, XVII, XVIII and XVIII of Shasta the Wolves by Olof Baker. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. THE DANGER FROM THE SOUTH It was the old medicine-man, Shoshani, and he was making medicine to himself on the high lookout-butte that commanded the prairies to the south. The sunset was beginning to be crimson in the west. It struck full in Shoshani's face, turning it blood-red. But Shoshani had no thought for the color of his face. He had another thought inside him. A thought of such tremendous importance that there was no room for anything besides. And this was that a danger lay there ambushed in the south. No one else but Shoshani knew of the danger, but that was because he had a medicine which never told him lies, and which whispered things to him before they had arrived. And already it had whispered to him that danger was near, and he had heard the huskies give the ghost-bark when they saw the wind go by. When he had finished the medicine song he sat silent, gazing on the prairies. They looked very peaceful, lying abroad there under the sinking sun. Shoshani's eyes traveling over the immense levels saw nothing that served to increase the unquiet of his mind. Far to the south they're stretched, from the Shaska River westwards, a dusky band that was like a shadow cast by the sunset. Shoshani knew that it was a herd of buffalo, one of those vast herds in which those old end-end days roamed over the wilderness for a thousand miles, coming always from the lake of mystery in the south. Going no man knew whither, which no man had ever counted, or would count till the pale faces came from the east, and the red man's day was done. Shoshani watched the buffalo's keenly. So long as they continued their tranquil feeding he knew that whatever danger was afoot it had not yet approached the outskirts of the herd. For the buffalo are very wary and are always ready to stampede. Yet although his eyes were fixed intently out there so many miles away, his ears were alert for anything that might happen close about. So although he did not turn his head, he heard the faint whisper of the dried bent grass as Shasta and his summer moggisons came lightly up the hill. When he reached Shoshani, Shasta did not speak. It is the pale faces who rush at each other with their tongues. The red man is never in a hurry with his speech. Why should you hasten your words when the prairies are so broad beside you, and there are no clocks to tick off for you the timeless drift of the summer air? It is only in the cities that men have learnt to waste the hours by counting them, and on the high buttes facing the sunset there is no time. So the sun dipped below the prairie before at last Shoshani spoke. The buffalo go west, he said slowly, as if the thing was of the utmost importance. Shasta did not put a question actually into words, but he looked at it. Shoshani understood. There is much pasture to the west, the buffalo eat the prairie to the setting sun. Do they eat the edge of the sunset also? Shasta asked. Shoshani shook his head. The edge of the sunset is the end of the world, he said. At the end of all things there is no more grass. Shasta was silent at that. It was so unbelievable. The thought stunned him. No more grass? But beyond the sunset Shoshani went on. When you come to the happy hunting grounds the grass is always green. And there the blue flower of the Camus never fades, and the Sarvastberries never decay. Happy hunting grounds. Shasta murmured in his low husky voice. Where? Shoshani lifted his hand. Up there, presently, he said, You will see the wolf trail. It is along the wolf trail that you travel to reach them. The wolf trail is worn across the heavens by the moccasins of the dead. The hunting is better there than it is here, Shasta asked. Is there more game? It is not better hunting, Shoshani said, correcting him. It is happier. The dead are full of happiness as they follow along the trail. After that there was a long silence, as Shasta kept looking at the sky to watch for the beginning of the wolf trail. When the stars should appear. But before that happened Shoshani spoke again. This time he spoke quickly, using many words. He spoke so rapidly and the words followed each other so fast that at first Shasta could not understand. All he gathered was that danger was in the air. Some great danger which yet you could not see. But which was approaching, always drawing steadily nearer out there on the prairies, and which might arrive before you knew. Then as Shoshani went on, the danger took a shape. It was the shape of Indians on the warpath. A city-boying that came with deadly cunning and purpose, traveling like wolves along the prairie hollows. Shasta sent his eyes far across the darkening plains, where all things were becoming shadowy and remote. And where even the great bird of buffalo beyond Shaska was no longer visible. How far away the Assini-Boines might be he could not guess, nor could Shoshani tell him when he asked. All Shoshani knew was that they were coming, and that when he had finished his medicine-making he would go and warn the tribe. Of one thing only he was certain. And that was, that however near they might be, they would not attack at night. The Assini-Boines were fierce and cruel, but they dreaded the darkness, because they declared that the ghosts of their enemies and many evil spirits were abroad. Their favorite hour of attack was just at daybreak, when the first glimmer of dawn was mingling with the mist. When the last light of sunset had faded from the sky, and the prairies were wholly dark, Shasta and Shoshani returned to the camp. Shasta lay awake long that night, listening and wondering. The words of the old medicine-man kept walking in his head. Sometimes it was of the buffaloes, he thought, with their pasture that lay out into the sunset, and was a shimmer along the long lights of the west. And sometimes that mysterious danger that crept nearer and nearer, and gave no sign of its approach. And then the butterfly, the sleepbringer, flitted across his eyelids and he slept. It was the western lark's barrel that woke him in the morning, singing loud and clear upon the lodge-pole over his head. And when he saw the sunlight clear through the painted wall of the teepee, and heard the cheerful morning stir of the camp, it seemed impossible that danger should be afoot in that tremendous peace. Yet as the day wore on, and evening drew near, he felt the same foreboding at his heart as when Shoshani had spoken to him of danger when they sat on the lookout bluff. As for Shoshani, he sat there all day, without food or drink, gazing steadily across the prairies and chanting the old medicine chants of the tribe. When evening fell Shoshani returned. He had already warned the tribe of what he feared, and Big Eagle had given orders that all was to be in readiness in case of an attack. Scouts had been sent out, but had returned at sundown, saying that no signs of hostile indents had been seen. When Shasta went to bed that night, the buffalo robe held no sleep for him, and wherever the butterfly flitted it did not enter his teepee. All night long he lay awake, restless and uneasy. Often and often he left his couch and looked out. The camp was very still, and the stars in their high places glittered bright in a cloudless sky. Now and then the small gray owl hooted dismely from the altar thickets beside the creek, or a coyote would bark fitfully somewhere far off in the night. Shasta had not yet grown used to the prairie. It was so vast, so unenclosed. The forest with its crowding trees and the immense gloom of a hundred miles of shade was the thing that made him feel at home. But now the camp of his people was pitched far out on the prairie, and the forest only existed in his dreams. As for Nitka and Shumu and the Wolf Brothers, they seemed even farther off and to move in some old life lost among the trees. Three times already since his first coming to the camp it had been moved. The ends of the new lodge poles cut in spring among the foothills and dragged by the ponies for enormous distances, now showed signs of wear. The camp at present lay in a white hollow surrounded by swelling ridges, and hidden from side until you were close upon it. The outlook bluff upon which Shoshani had kept his watch lay a good half-mile to the south, and commanded an immense sweep of the prairie on every hand. The last time Shasta had crept out of the teepee he had looked towards the bluff. It humped itself, a black mass against the stars, like a huge bull buffalo crouched in sleep. When he crept noiselessly back it seemed to follow him, and when at last sleep overtook him it was humped among his dreams. Suddenly he was wide awake, his heart throbbing. Something, he did not know what, had called to him and roused him from his rest. The teepee was still dark but a faint glimmer, so faint as to be scarcely seen, showed that daybreak was at hand. Shasta sat up, his eyes straining in the dimness, and his ears listening as only wild animals listen when they are startled. For a little while he heard nothing but the stillness, which itself was so deep that it seemed as if it were a sort of sound. Then, clear and strikingly distinct, he heard repeated the sound which had broken his sleep. It was a wolf howl, long drawn and wailing, and it was answered directly afterwards by another, and yet another. The cries were some distance off. How far Shasta could not tell. The third came from some spot on the prairie beyond the lookout bluff. Every pulse in Shasta's body beat an answer to the cries. A wild excitement swept through him. His mind seemed for a moment to throw off its end in teaching and swing back into the wild. Yet, wolf-like though the cries were, so alike that only the wolves themselves would have detected the difference, Shasta's perfect sense of hearing told him that these wailing notes came from no wolf-throats, but from those of Indians who imitated with marvelous closeness the familiar cry. Shoshoni was right. The danger was at hand. It was within speaking distance. It sang a death note in the dawn. Shasta lost no time. He ran swiftly to Big Eagle's teepee, without waiting for any ceremony he snatched aside the flap and stepped inside. Rousing the chief he told him what he had heard. Immediately Big Eagle sprang from his buffalo robes and seizing his arms rushed out into the center of the camp, uttering the gathering cry. Instantly the whole camp was aroused. The braves came running out of the teepees, their bows in their hands and their long quiver slung over their backs. In less than five minutes the sleeping village was turned into an armed camp, with every man it contained prepared for the fight. In the midst of the excitement Shasta disappeared. When Big Eagle commanded the presence of the medicine wolf-boy no one could say what had become of him. Some were inclined to think that he had played a trick upon them, and there was no danger at all. But Shoshani, the old medicine man, waved his arms excitedly, and declared over and over again that Shasta had been warned by the spirits, and that the Asenie Boynes were now close at hand. Chapter 17 Shasta Goes Scouting When Shasta had given the warning and knew that the tribe was fully roused, he crept out of camp. He went so secretly that no one saw him go. Why he went he could hardly have told himself in the shape of a thought. If the cries had not been wolf cries, it is probable he would not have gone. He was certain that they were not the genuine wolf calls, yet they came so very close to them that an uneasy feeling inside him made him want to find out what sort of throat could make so exact an imitation. The direction of his going was towards the lookout butte, from beyond which the last cry had come. If danger was gathering in the prairie hollows, it would be from the summit of the butte that you could tell the nature of it, and whether it was widespread or closely drawn. As he approached the butte, his eyes and ears were open at their widest. Things were indistinct and shadowy in the faint glimmer of the dawn. Yet shadowy though they were, Shasta's piercing eyes stabbed them through and through. Every bush, every clump of grass, every rise or fall of the ground, nothing escaped his piercing gaze. He saw the buck rabbit leap into the thicket. He saw the coyote drift like a trail of gray smoke over the ridge. And while his eyes and ears were busy, he did not forget his nose. With the true wolf instinct he traveled upwind. Whatever sense were abroad in the keen air, he would catch them surely and sift them in his cunning nose. In the early freshness of the dawn the smell of the ground was sweet with dew. There was not so much breeze as a soft moving of the air. Along it the whole vast body of the prairie seemed to breathe to the tip of Shasta's nose. By this time the broad sweet prairie smell was familiar to him. By contrast with the old smells of the forest seemed to be sharp and thin, like arrowheads piercing the brain. But as Shasta knew, this broader prairie smell was made up of a countless multitude of tiny odors that mixed themselves so confusedly that only the stronger ones could be disentangled from the rest. For some time he did not get any smell which told him of danger, and he had reached the foot of the Butte before he met anything suspicious. Suddenly he stopped. As far as you could see or hear, except that the light was a little stronger, everything was exactly as it had been. And yet, to Shasta's quick sense, something had happened, and he knew that he was warned. It was not that he saw or heard anything first. It was his nose which had caught something that was not a prairie smell. It was not of a thing that was there now. The thing had gone by, but the scent of its passing clung still to the grass blades, and Shasta seemed to see the end in body which had left that faint message of itself in smell. Then he found the trail, the dim thing that only wild eyes could see as it lay in the morning twilight. At first he wondered what to do, whether to follow the track or to go up the Butte. He knew that whatever he did must be done at once, or he might be too late. He went swiftly up the Butte. When he reached the top he lay at full length, gazing intently over the prairies. In the pale light of the creeping dawn they looked whiter than ever. They seemed to stretch away and away endlessly, as if the world did not cease at the horizon, but stooped down under the sky. Shasta's eyes swept that huge greyness with a lightning glance. The hollows lay roughly from northeast to southwest. It was only here and there that it was possible to see their bottoms or what might be concealed along the borders of the streams. For some minutes Shasta saw nothing suspicious. Then, about two hundred yards to the west, he saw a creeping shape move across the top of a ridge and disappear. It was followed by another and then another. They slid very quickly over the open summit of the ridge. At the very first glance he knew they were not wolves. He watched a great number pass over in that peculiar sliding way. When there was a pause, and no more seemed to be coming, Shasta turned to leave the Butte. What he saw as he did so made his heart leap. There, not twenty yards away from the foot of the Butte, stood an end in, with his bow in his hand ready to shoot. At once Shasta realized that it was a stranger, one of the hostile tribe about to attack the camp. While his mind worked swiftly, deciding what to do, his body never moved a muscle. There he was, crouched upon the Butte, as motionless as if he'd been suddenly turned to stone. If he attempted to escape the end in by running east or west, he knew by the way the brave held his bow that a terrible winged shaft would come singing through the air. The end in said evidently seen him on the Butte, and one of them had been told off to watch that he did not return to camp to carry a warning before the attack was made. By creeping to the top of the Butte, in order to reconnoiter the outer prairies, Shasta saw that he had exposed himself to hidden danger behind. He saw himself cut off from the camp, utterly alone. He had already given warning it is true, but his people might not know that the enemy were so close upon them, nor how many were gathering for the attack. And whatever happened, he would be utterly powerless to help them in the fight with their relentless foes. A feeling of desperation, of anger, over-swept him. It was like the anger which had wrapped its flames about him when he had turned on Muschewank the bully. Suddenly, in a flash, he turned and darted over the brow of the hill. Instantly the end in shot, but Shasta had been too quick for him, and the arrow buried itself in the hillside. Shasta was hidden now by the hill, and the end in could not tell which way he had gone. The boy went down the hill at a tremendous pace in a series of flying bounds. When he reached the bottom he turned sharp to the left. There was broken ground here and a number of thickets. Threading his way cautiously through these, Shasta worked eastwards, meaning to approach the camp from the far north-eastern side. He had not gone very far when he heard a series of war hoops, followed by savvy gels, and he knew that the battle had begun. He regretted now that he had not brought his own bow and arrows with him. His only weapon was the flint tomahawk in his belt. There was much more light now, he could see everything clearly, but the camp was not in sight, because it was hidden in its hollow to the west. The sounds of the fight came to him plainly in the clear morning air. There was a knoll in front of him. He ran towards it, stooping low as in his wolf days. He had only just reached it, and had thrown himself flat on his stomach, when all at once he heard the running of many feet. The sound was coming in his direction. He lay where he was, absolutely still. All at once he was surrounded by Indians. Something struck him sharply in the back of his head, and he remembered nothing more. When he came to himself, he found himself lying across the back of an Indian pony, with a horrible aching in his head. The pony was at a gallop. He felt that he was held in his place by the rider. He could not see the rider. He saw nothing but a blur of grass that seemed as if it billowed under him in flowing waves. The blood in his head made a singing like grasshoppers. There was a tightness there as if it were going to burst. He tried to think, but thoughts would not come. He could not tell why he was on the pony's back. Only the sharp smell of its sweating flanks entered his brain as one smells things in a dream. Then the seeds of grass billowed away into nothingness, and it was a blackness where lightnings flashed. That was all he remembered of that long ride over the prairies, as he was carried by the Asiniboins back to their hunting grounds in the far northwest. It was not till many moons afterwards that he learned that, owing to his warning, their attack had only partially succeeded, and that his tribe had beaten them off after a fierce encounter in which both sides had lost heavily. When the Asiniboins reached their camp, Shasta was thrown into a teepee and left to come to himself as best he might. It was not long before he was forced to realize what had happened, and he knew that he was a prisoner in the hands of the enemies of his tribe. What he did not know was that they had carried him off to kill him at their great Sundance as a religious offering. Quite unknown to himself, his fame as a medicine man had traveled far and wide over the prairies, and had even reached the mountains in the west. This was the wolf medicine which had made his tribe so powerful since his coming to them. Once he could be killed, the medicine power would be destroyed also, but as their own medicine men assured them it could be destroyed only by fire. The weeks went by, he was allowed out of the teepee by day, but bound with thongs every night, so that he could not move. He was given much food in order to make him fat and pleasant for the ceremony. As the time of the great dance drew near, the Indians redoubled their watch upon him. He was not even allowed to come out of the teepee during the day. The heat and the lack of exercise made him suffer in body and in mind. All he knew of the outside world came to him through the hides of the teepee. He would lie awake in the night, listening to the sounds that stirred abroad, and longings unspeakably to be out in the cool air under the star glimmer in the sky. And then the moon would rise and the interior of the teepee would appear in a silver gloom. It was at the moon rising that Shasta's restlessness increased till it was like a flame that licked along his bones. His brain was on fire. All the pulses of his body beat in the burning of the flames. Then he would crouch, staring with bloodshot eyes that seemed as if they burnt holes in the teepee and pierced into the night. Now and then he would moan a little, or make low wolf noises in his dry throat. But for the most part he was silent, suffering dumbly, as animals suffer, feeling the old free wolf life tugging at his heart. Then there would come a moment when it was impossible to bear the torture in silence, and he would throw back his head and vent his misery in howl after howl. It was small wonder if the Indians beat him for that. Those dismal notes, ringing out in the deep silence of the night, were enough to make the toughest brave uneasy in his heart. So each night that Shasta howled he was beaten, and still the feeling was too strong to be overcome, and he was beaten again. Then, when it was over, and he lay panting and bruised, he would fall upon his thongs in a blind rage, striving to tear them with his teeth. But his teeth were not the fangs of Nitka, and the rawhide thongs resisted his utmost efforts. So when dawn broke he would lie exhausted, and fall into an aching sort of slumber till they came to unbind him for the day. Once or twice during these nightly howlings he fancied he heard an answering cry far off among the hills, and once there had been a scratching outside the tepee, and he was certain that a wolf was there. But before he could come to conversation with it an Indian had arrived to beat him, and it had slipped away. At last the night came before the great dance that was to take place the next morning at the rising of the sun. It was in the beginning of the dance that a great fire would be lighted, and that Shasta would be burned, bound fast to a stake driven into the ground. No one told him that this was his last night, and that it was on the morrow that he would be killed. Yet for all that some instinct warned him that some terrible thing was afoot, and that the end was close at hand. It was in vain that he had waited all these weeks for his tribe to follow and rescue him. Either they had been too severely punished by the Asiniboins to dare to follow till they had increased their strength, or else they had delayed too long and now had lost the trail. So long he had looked for that rescue from the southeast, and the sun had risen and set and the moon had waxed and waned, and waxed again, and still there had sounded through the foothills no thunder of pony's hoofs, nor ringing war cry as the avenging braves swept on. The night was very still. Moonrise was at hand. For two nights in succession something had stolen to the outside of Shasta's teepee. It had stayed only a short time, sniffing and scratching, and then had melted into the shadowy masses of the hills. Shasta had spoken to it. He had said very little, but then, being wolf-taught, he knew just what to say. And so the mysterious visitor had departed wiser than it came. No one saw this creature, either when it had entered camp or departed. Even the husky dogs did not detect it in their sleep. On softly cushioned feet it glided noiselessly straight to the spot it sought, and when it had paid its visit, seemed to float along the ground, mountain words like a trail of black mist. And now, in a terrible suspense, Shasta was waiting, wondering if the thing would come on this the last night, and whether its coming would bring a message of hope. Suddenly his eyes shone and a thrill passed through him. Outside, close against the bottom of the teepee, he heard a sniff. It was the sound a wolf makes when it takes the air deeply into its lungs and then sends it out quickly. Shasta began to talk wolf-taught close to the edge of the teepee. The creature outside answered. Then, in a few moments, it melted into the night. When it was gone, Shasta felt more utterly alone than before. He was restless, excited, nervous to a high degree. It was little wonder if he gave voice to the pent-up wretchedness within him in howl after piercing howl. They let him howl that night without beating him, because they thought it was the last time the medicine boy would lift his wolf voice to the moon, and it was his death-song that he sang. Shasta did not howl for long that time. He contended himself by howling at intervals that were longer or shorter, as his feelings mastered him. But presently his reason for howling changed. Down the long throats of the canyons between the hills there came now and solo, now in concert, a series of calls that set Shasta's blood ablaze. He answered the calls time after time. He knew every variation of them, from the deep-throated note that was almost a bellow, to the thin-sharp call of the half-grown cub yearning for a kill. And as Shasta sent out his desperate messages in reply, he used every note of the wolf language that he knew. Up and down the hills, wailing along the ridges, sobbing in the hollows, went the wild cries for help, and the answering cries that help was at hand. At daybreak the howling ceased. Over all the wilderness stole the gray silence, the silence of the dawn. Shasta, line bound in his teepee, watched the cold light as it slowly grew. All at once, directly above his head, a clear song trilled forth. It was a lark's barrel perched upon the top of a lodge pole and welcoming the day. Often and often he had listened to that song before and loved it for its gladsome sound. But then he had been safe among his own people, and free to go in and out as he chose. Now the song brought home to him afresh the sense of his loneliness and utter helplessness, bound by the cruel thongs. The song ceased as suddenly as it had begun, and almost immediately afterwards the teepee was entered by two Indians. Without unbinding Shasta, they lifted him up and carried him outside. There he found an old white war-horse attached to a Trevoy, or Indian carriage. Shasta had seen a Trevoy before, but had never ridden in one. It was a sort of seed or basket fastened to poles, the thin ends of which crossed in front of the horse, while the thick ends trailed along the ground. The Indians placed him on the Trevoy and then stood beside him, waiting for the signal to start. On all sides Shasta saw that the camp was in movement. All the braves were in their war-paint, and were their big war-bonnet stiff with feathers. It was plain to see that it was a very great occasion, and that no pains would be spared to make it a success. CHAPTER 18 THE WOLVES OF VENGE Presently, at a given sign, the procession started. It was led by an old medicine man who moved slowly forward, singing a medicine chant as he walked. He was extremely old and shriveled and was smothered in paint and feathers. And he had a husky voice that cut the air like a saw. Behind him rode the chief on horseback, a splendid figure of a man, upright as a dart, and magnificently dressed. Immediately after him came Shasta on the Trevoy. The braves followed in a long line. Shasta's heart was heavy with fear. No one told him what was going to be done with him, yet a terrible foreboding made him shiver now and then. And yet the birds twittered, and the air was fragrant with the scent of the dew-drenched grass, and the sky blew between the trails of mist. All the world seemed so full of life and free, except himself only, bound and aching on the Trevoy. When the procession reached the top of a high ridge, the Trevoy was stopped. The Indians lifted Shasta out and bound him to a stake driven into the ground. Around the stake they piled faggots of wood. When this was finished, the medicine man sprinkled dried sweet grass over the pile, so that when the flame froze up there might be a pleasant smell. During the preparations the braves arranged themselves in a large circle about the stake. As soon as the arrangements were completed they waited for the medicine man to light the fire, and sing the words which would be the signal for the opening of the dance. There was a pause. For a few moments nothing happened. It was one of those strange pieces of silence which dropped sometimes even into the center of civilized life, and people become uneasy, they could not tell you why. Only when the mist went on trailing over the ridge, swain weirdly as the air pushed. It was still cold with the freshness left by the dawn, and although the sun had already risen, his beams were not strong enough as yet to dispel the dense masses of mist that kept rising from all the lower grounds. Near or distant, so far as Shasta's keen ears could detect, nothing stirred. The fat blue grouse which had been feeding on the blueberries had fled at the Indians' approach. The old coyote who had made her den on the south side of the hill was out hunting with their young ones and had not yet returned. For any sight or sound that declared itself, the lonely ridge at the edge of the prairies was a dead lump of burned-up summer grass where not a living creature stirred. In that tremendous pause when all the worlds seemed to be waiting, Shasta threw back his head and gave the long gathering cry of the wolves. That call for help went ringing far from the summit of the ridge. The hollow places sucked it in and gave back sobbing echoes of its desperate need. One long cry that was not an echo came from the hills in answer. That was all. Then the silence of the wild closed down, and you could hear your heart beat in your side. From the prairies, from the hills, from the mountains beyond, no sound came. The familiar shapes of things were theirs before, but they were dumb, blind, motionless, strangled in the mist. Close by a small fire already burning, the medicine man stood with fork-stick in his hand, ready to take the live coal which had light the faggots about the stake. And as he stood, he kept repeating to himself now and again the strange words of a world-old medicine chant, so strange and old that even for him the original meaning of the words had departed, leaving crooked shapes and sounds behind. The eyes of all the assembled Indians were fastened intently upon him. When he should have finished the chant, he would take the live coal from the fire, and the great death-dance would begin. It was the dance by which they would celebrate the burning of the evil spirit or medicine which they believed chast embodied, and which once destroyed, would enable them to vanquish all their foes. And then, when the dance began, and became wilder and wilder as the flames mounted higher at the stake, the whole hill-top would be alive with Indian shapes that swayed madly in the mist. But what shapes were those coming down from the foothills, those long, flowing shapes with tongues that rolled and eyes that shone? There was no warning sound that told of their coming. They flowed down the hill-sides in a gray flood that rippled but did not break. Down the hills, past the Indian camp, through the valley bottom, out on the prairie, it flowed uninterruptedly till it reached the foot of the ridge. And still, to all outward seeming, the world appeared exactly as it was before, as if the sun himself, with all the vast lonely spaces of sky and earth, and all the creatures they contained, were waiting for that terrible moment when the medicine chant should cease. As foreshadowed himself, after that first despairing cry, he had not moved a muscle of his body. He felt that the end was near at hand, that nothing but a miracle could save him now. The medicine chant was drawing to a close. The medicine man moved a pace or two nearer to the fire. Round the great circle of expectant braves there passed a thrill that went through them like a swift flame. For a second or two Shasta fell as if his heart had stopped. In that instant, a short, deep-throated bellow came up from the mist below. It was the signal for the attack, and there was no other warning. Yet there they all were—Nitka, Shumu, the foster brothers who remembered Shasta, and the other brothers who did not, and many others besides—belonging to widely sundered packs—hundreds and hundreds of them, all united under the leadership of the giant Shumu for one great purpose of rescuing Shasta from the hands of his cruel foes. Up the sides of the ridge they bounded, those long, gray bodies that seemed buoyant like the mist. When they reached the summit there was not an instant's pause. In one ringing wolf voice the whole of the united packs gave tongue. Already the medicine man had taken the live coal on the stick and was just about to set it to the dried grass around the stake when he was hurled to the earth by the leaping form of a tremendous wolf, none other than Shumu himself. As he fell an Indian darted forward, intending to bury his tomahawk in the wolf. But before he could do so Shumu had leaped away from the prostate figure and in an instant had thrown himself on his assailant. There was a gleam as the raised tomahawk caught the light. Yet though it descended it inflicted no fatal wound, and the Indian was born helplessly to the ground, from which he never rolls again. The Indians fought desperately, but they were hopelessly outnumbered from the first. There were wolves everywhere. If one was killed or disabled half a dozen more instantly filled his place. They came from all quarters, surging up from the lower ground in waves that seemed as if they would never end. On every hand the fight raged furiously. On all sides it was the same mass of dark leaping bodies, gleaming eyes, and white fangs that tore and slashed. And everywhere it was Shumu, Nitka, and the wolf-brothers that did the deadliest work. Shumu himself seemed to be everywhere at once. Over and over again Shasta, shivering and frenzied with excitement as he watched the progress of the fight, saw the giant form of the great father-wolf hurl itself through the air and strike some struggling Indian to the ground. Would the wolves win? Would the wolves win? That was the agonizing thought that made Shasta shake from head to foot. If they did he was saved. If not then all was lost. He would be doomed to die the terrible death by fire. He wretched and strained in a vain attempt to lose his bonds. His utmost effort was no avail. Whatever was the result of the contest he knew that he must remain helpless to the end. Once or twice a wild despair seized him. There came a pause in the fight as if the wolves wavered. Suppose after all the Indians were able to hold their own. In spite of their terrible losses they had killed many of their wolfish foes. Numbers of them lay dead or dying. It would be small wonder if, after all, the rest should grow intimidated and slink off. Yet after each temporary lull there would be a fresh attack led by Shumu or Nitka, and again the world would ring with the terrible gathering cry of the Paks. At last the Indians could hold out no longer. Utterly unprepared as they were for this fearful horde of undreamed of enemies, feeling too that their medicine had deserted them and that the Great Spirit, being offended, had abandoned them to their fate. Their survivors lost their presence of mind and fled shrieking down the hill. Few, very few, ever found their way back to camp. It was the wolf triumph, the wolf revenge. The ridge, from end to end, was strewn with Indian dead. It was Nitka herself who released Shasta, and her famous teeth which tore the thongs from his arms and legs. And after long impatient work, at last set him free. And when he lay on the ground, almost two days to understand, with his whole body feeling like one big bruise, it was her loving tongue that comforted him, caressing him back to life. The sun was already high in the heavens before Shasta was strong enough to move. Then, with Nitka on one side and Shumu on the other, and the wolf brothers all abound on every hand, Shasta started for home. But it was not the home of his Indian kin. It was the cave upon the barglash, far away from the tread of human feet, the old strange home whose rocky walls seemed to him to hold the beginnings of his life. Did he go back to his people later? Did he say goodbye to the wolf folk forever, and forget the ways of the wild? Perhaps, who can say? Perhaps Gomposh could tell you, or even Gohoopare. You mind entice it out of Shoshani when his face goes red on the lookout butte towards the setting sun. But if he went back, which is possible, I do not think he would ever forget. For the wild and the ways of its folk are too great to be forgotten. And then, you see, he was Shasta of the wolves. End of chapter 16, 17, and 18. End of Shasta of the Wolves by Olaf Baker