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Page 39
"Ah, in a few months more, if he should leap at the throat of M'sieu
the Factor," he said to himself one day.
In September, when he was six months old, Baree was almost as large as
Gray Wolf--big-boned, long-fanged, with a deep chest, and jaws that
could already crack a bone as if it were a stick. He was with Nepeese
whenever and wherever she moved. They swam together in the two
pools--the pool in the forest and the pool between the chasm walls. At
first it alarmed Baree to see Nepeese dive from the rock wall over
which she had pushed McTaggart, but at the end of a month she had
taught him to plunge after her through that twenty feet of space.
It was late in August when Baree saw the first of his kind outside of
Kazan and Gray Wolf. During the summer Pierrot allowed his dogs to run
at large on a small island in the center of a lake two or three miles
away, and twice a week he netted fish for them. On one of these trips
Nepeese accompanied him and took Baree with her. Pierrot carried his
long caribou-gut whip. He expected a fight. But there was none. Baree
joined the pack in their rush for fish, and ate with them. This pleased
Pierrot more than ever.
"He will make a great sledge dog," he chuckled. "It is best to leave
him for a week with the pack, ma Nepeese."
Reluctantly Nepeese gave her consent. While the dogs were still at
their fish, they started homeward. Their canoe had slipped away before
Baree discovered the trick they had played on him. Instantly he leaped
into the water and swam after them--and the Willow helped him into his
canoe.
Early in September a passing Indian brought Pierrot word of Bush
McTaggart. The factor had been very sick. He had almost died from the
blood poison, but he was well now. With the first exhilarating tang of
autumn in the air a new dread oppressed Pierrot. But at present he said
nothing of what was in his mind to Nepeese. The Willow had almost
forgotten the factor from Lac Bain, for the glory and thrill of
wilderness autumn was in her blood. She went on long trips with
Pierrot, helping him to blaze out the new trap lines that would be used
when the first snows came, and on these journeys she was always
accompanied by Baree.
Most of Nepeese's spare hours she spent in training him for the sledge.
She began with a babiche string and a stick. It was a whole day before
she could induce Baree to drag this stick without turning at every
other step to snap and growl at it. Then she fastened another length of
babiche to him, and made him drag two sticks. Thus little by little she
trained him to the sledge harness, until at the end of a fortnight he
was tugging heroically at anything she had a mind to fasten him to.
Pierrot brought home two of the dogs from the island, and Baree was put
into training with these, and helped to drag the empty sledge. Nepeese
was delighted. On the day the first light snow fell she clapped her
hands and cried to Pierrot:
"By midwinter I will have him the finest dog in the pack, mon pere!"
This was the time for Pierrot to say what was in his mind. He smiled.
Diantre--would not that beast the factor fall into the very devil of a
rage when he found how he had been cheated! And yet--
He tried to make his voice quiet and commonplace.
"I am going to send you down to the school at Nelson House again this
winter, ma cherie," he said. "Baree will help draw you down on the
first good snow."
The Willow was tying a knot in Baree's babiche, and she rose slowly to
her feet and looked at Pierrot. Her eyes were big and dark and steady.
"I am not going, mon pere!"
It was the first time Nepeese had ever said that to Pierrot--in just
that way. It thrilled him. And he could scarcely face the look in her
eyes. He was not good at bluffing. She saw what was in his face; it
seemed to him that she was reading what was in his mind, and that she
grew a little taller as she stood there. Certainly her breath came
quicker, and he could see the throb of her breast. Nepeese did not wait
for him to gather speech.
"I am not going!" she repeated with even greater finality, and bent
again over Baree.
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