Rydal threw up his rifle. The shot came. It burned
a crease in Wapi's shoulder and tore a hole as big as a man's fist in the
breast of a dog about to spring upon him f rom behind. Again he was down,
and Rydal dropped his rifle, and snatched a whip from the hand of an
Eskimo. Shouting and cursing, he lashed the pack, and in a moment he saw
a huge, open-jawed shadow rise up on the far side and start off into the
open starlight. He sprang back to his rifle. Twice he fired at the
retreating shadow before it disappeared. And the Eskimo dogs made no
movement to follow. Five of the fifteen were dead. The remaining ten,
torn and bleeding--three of them with legs that dragged in the bloody
snow--gathered in a whipped and whimpering group. And the Eskimos,
shivering in their fear of this devil that had entered into the body of
Wapi, the Walrus, failed to respond to Rydal's command when he pointed to
the red trail that ran out under the stars.
At Fort Confidence, one hundred and fifty miles to the south, there was
day--day that was like cold, gray dawn, the day one finds just beyond the
edge of the Arctic night, in which the sun hangs like a pale lantern over
the far southern horizon. In a log-built room that faced this bit of
glorious red glow lay Peter, bolstered up in his bed so that he could see
it until it faded from the sky. There was a new light in his face, and
there was something of the old Peter back in his eyes.
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