Белый Клык / White Fang. Джек Лондон
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greatly worried by this new adventure.
They went down the valley of the stream, until they came to the end of the valley, where the stream ran into the Mackenzie River. Here a camp was made; and White Fang looked on with wondering eyes. The superiority of these man-an- imals increased with every moment. But greater than everything else seemed to the wolf-cub their power over things not alive. They made tepees, and canoes, and could dry fish.
At first tepees frightened him. He saw the women and children passing in and out of them without harm, and he saw the dogs trying often to get into them, and being driven away with sharp words and flying stones. After a time, he left Kiche’s side and crawled cautiously toward the wall of the nearest tepee. It was the curiosity of growth that made him move. At last his nose touched the canvas. He waited. Nothing happened. Then he smelled the strange fabric, saturated with the man-smell. He closed on the canvas with his teeth and gave a gentle tug. Nothing happened. He tugged harder. There was a greater movement. It was delightful. He tugged still harder, until the whole tepee was in motion. Then he heard a sharp woman’s cry from inside and ran back to Kiche. But after that he was afraid no more.
A moment later he was running away again from his mother. Her stick was tied to a stake in the ground and she could not follow him. A part-grown puppy, somewhat larger and older than he, came toward him slowly, with some importance. The puppy’s name, as White Fang afterward heard, was Lip-lip. He had lived his life in camp and had fought many puppy fights. Three times, four times, and half a dozen times, his sharp little teeth scored on the newcomer, until White Fang, crying shamelessly, fled to the protection of his mother. It was the first of the many fights he was to have with Lip-lip, for they were enemies from the start.
Kiche licked White Fang soothingly with her tongue, and tried to make him remain with her. But several minutes later he was looking for a new adventure. He came upon one of the man-animals, Grey Beaver, who was rubbing his hams and doing something with sticks and dry moss spread before him on the ground. White Fang came near to him and watched.
Women and children were carrying more sticks and branches to Grey Beaver. White Fang came in until he touched Grey Beaver’s knee, so curious was he. Suddenly he saw a strange thing like mist beginning to arise from the sticks and moss. Then there appeared a live moving thing, of the colour of the sun in the sky. White Fang knew nothing about fire. It drew him, as the light in the mouth of the cave had drawn him in his early puppyhood. Then his nose touched the flame, and at the same instant his little tongue went out to it.
For a moment he was paralysed. The unknown, lurking in the midst of the sticks and moss, was savagely holding him by the nose. He jumped backward, with an astonished explosion of ki-yi’s. At the sound, Kiche leaped snarling to the end of her stick, but could not come to his aid. But Grey Beaver laughed loudly, and then everybody was laughing. But White Fang sat on his haunches and ki-yi’d and ki-yi’d, a forgotten little figure among the man-animals.
It was the worst hurt he had ever known. Both nose and tongue had been hurt by the live thing, sun-coloured, that had grown up under Grey Beaver’s hands. He cried and cried, and every new squeal was met by bursts of laughter. He tried to soothe his nose with his tongue, but the tongue was burnt too, and the two hurts coming together produced greater hurt; so he cried more hopelessly and helplessly than ever.
And he felt shame that the man-animals were laughing at him. He turned and fled away, not from the hurt of the fire, but from the laughter that sank even deeper, and hurt in the spirit of him. And he fled to Kiche, the one creature in the world who was not laughing at him.
Night came on, and White Fang lay by his mother’s side. His nose and tongue still hurt, but there was a greater trouble. He was homesick. He felt a need for the stream and their cave. Life had become too populous. There were so many of the man-animals, men, women, and children. And there were the dogs. The calm loneliness of the only life he had known was gone.
He watched the man-animals coming and going and moving about the camp.
They were fire-makers! They were gods.
Chapter II. THE BONDAGE
During the time that Kiche was tied by the stick, White Fang ran about over all the camp. He quickly came to know much about the man- animals. It was easy to believe they were gods. As his mother, Kiche, had showed her loyalty to them at the first cry of her name, so he was beginning to render his loyalty. When they walked, he got out of their way. When they called, he came. When they commanded him to go, he went away. For behind any wish of theirs was power to enforce that wish, power that hurt, power that expressed itself hits and clubs, in flying stones and whips.
He belonged to them as all dogs belonged to them. Such was the lesson that he learnt in the camp. It came hard. It was a placing of his destiny in another’s hands.
But it did not all happen in a day, this giving over of himself, body and soul, to the man- animals. There were days when he went to the edge of the forest and stood and listened to something calling him far and away. And always he returned, restless and uncomfortable, to whimper softly and wistfully at Kiche’s side and to lick her face with eager, questioning tongue.
White Fang learned rapidly the ways of the camp. He knew the injustice and greediness of the older dogs when meat or fish was thrown out to be eaten. He knew that men were fairer, children crueller, and women kinder.
But the problem of his life was Lip-lip. Larger, older, and stronger, Lip-lip had selected White Fang for his special object of persecution. White Fang fought willingly enough, but his enemy was too big. Lip-lip became a nightmare to him.
But, though he was always defeated, his spirit remained unbroken. Yet a bad effect was produced. He became angry and morose. His temper had been savage by birth, but it became more savage under this persecution. The playful, puppyish side of him found little expression. He never played with the other puppies of the camp. Lip-lip did not let him to.
White Fang was robbed of much of his puppyhood and made older than his age. Having no outlet of his energies through play, he developed his mental processes. He became cunning. As he could not get his share of meat and fish when a general feed was given to the camp-dogs, he became a clever thief.
And, as Kiche, when she was with the wolves, had brought out to destruction the dogs from the camps of men, so White Fang brought Lip-lip into Kiche’s jaws. Lip-lip, excited by the chase, forgot caution and ran into Kiche lying at the end of her stick. She was tied, but he could not get away from her easily.
When at last he succeeded in rolling clear of her, he crawled to his feet, badly hurt both in body and in spirit. White Fang sank his teeth into his hind leg. He ran away shamelessly.
There came the day when Grey Beaver released Kiche. White Fang was delighted with his mother’s freedom. He accompanied her joyfully about the camp; and, as he remained close by her side, Lip-lip kept a respectful distance.
Later on that day, Kiche and White Fang strayed into the edge of the woods next to the camp. He had led his mother there, step by step, and now, when she stopped, he tried to call her farther. The stream, the lair, and the quiet woods were calling to him, and he wanted her to come. He ran on a few steps, stopped, and looked back. She did not move. He whined pleadingly, and jumped playfully in and out of the underbrush. He ran back to her, licked her face, and ran on again. And still she did not move. She turned her head and looked back at the camp.
There was something calling to him out there in the open. His mother heard it too. But she heard also the call of the fire and of man, the call which has been given—of all animals—to the wolf and the wild-dog, who are brothers.
Kiche turned and slowly trotted back toward camp. Stronger than the physical bondage was the clutch of the camp upon her. White Fang sat down in the shadow of a tree and whimpered softly. There were wood smells reminding him of his old life of freedom. But he was still only a part-grown puppy, and stronger than the call either of man or of the Wild was the call of his mother. All his short life he had depended upon her. The time has not yet come for independence. So he trotted back to camp, pausing once, and twice, to sit down and whimper and to listen to the call that still sounded in his ears.
In the Wild the time of a mother with her cub is short; but under the dominion