Allan and the Ice Gods (7 page)

have been as that wolf’s head.”

Then, suddenly, he remembered that this stone had fallen in answer to

his prayer; that it was the sign he had sought, and removed himself

swiftly, lest another that he had not sought should follow after it.

When he had run a few paces down the frozen slope, he came to a little

bay hollowed in the mountainside, and sat down, knowing that there he

was safe from falling stones. Confusedly, he began to think. What had

he asked the gods? Was it that he must fight Henga if the stone fell,

or that he must not fight him? Oh! now he remembered. It was that he

must fight as Aaka wished him to do, and a cold trembling shook his

limbs. To talk of fighting that raging giant was easy enough, but to

do it was another matter. Yet the gods had spoken, and he dared not

disobey the counsel that he had sought. Moreover, by sparing his life

from the falling stone, surely they meant that he would conquer Henga.

Or perhaps they only meant that they wished to see Henga tear him to

pieces for their sport, for the gods loved blood, and the gods were

cruel. Moreover, being evil themselves, would it not, perhaps, please

them to give victory to the evil man?

As he could not answer these questions, Wi rose and walked slowly

toward the beach, reflecting that probably he had seen his last of the

glacier and the Ice-gods who dwelt therein, he who was about to

challenge Henga to fight to the death. Presently he drew near to the

place where he had killed the wolf, and, looking up, was astonished to

see that someone was skinning the beast. Indeed, his fingers tightened

upon the haft of his spear, for this was a crime against the hunter’s

law—that one should steal what another had slain. Then the head of

the skinner appeared, and Wi smiled and loosened his grip of the

spear. For this was no thief, this was Pag, his slave who loved him.

A strange-looking man was Pag, a large-headed, one-eyed dwarf, great-chested, long-armed, powerful, but with thick little legs, no longer

than those of a child of eight years; a monstrous, flat-nosed, big-mouthed creature, who yet always wore upon his scarred countenance a

smiling, humorous air. It was told of Pag that, when he was born, a

long while before—for his youth had passed—he was so ugly that his

mother had thrown him out into the woods, fearing that his father, who

was absent killing seals farther up the beach, would be angry with her

for bearing such a son and purposing to tell him that the child had

been stillborn.

As it chanced, when the father came back, he went to search for the

infant’s bones, but in place of them found the babe still living, but

with one eye dashed out against a stone and its face much scarred.

Still, this being his first-born, and because he was a man with a

merciful heart, he brought it home into the hut, and forced the mother

to nurse it. This she did, like one who is frightened, though why she

was frightened she would not say, nor would his father ever tell where

and how he had found Pag. Thus it came about that Pag did not die, but

lived, and because of what his mother had done to him, always was a

hater of women; one, too, who lived much in the forest, for which

reason, or some other, he was named “wolf-man.” Moreover, he grew up

the cleverest of the tribe, for nature, which had made him ugly and

deformed, gave him more wits than the rest of them, and a sharp tongue

that he used to gibe with at the women.

Therefore they hated him also and made a plot against him, and when

there came a time of scarcity, persuaded the chief of the tribe of

that day, the father of Henga, that Pag was the cause of ill-fortune.

So that chief drove out Pag to starve. But when Pag was dying for lack

of food, Wi found him and brought him to his hut, where, although like

the rest of her sex Aaka loved him little, he remained as a slave; for

this was the law, that, if any saved a life, that life belonged to

him. In truth, however, Pag was more than a slave, because, from the

hour that Wi, braving the wrath of the women, who thought that they

were rid of Pag and his gibes, and perchance the anger of the chief,

had rescued him when he was starving in a season of bitter frost, Pag

loved him more than a woman loves her first-born, or a young man his

one-day bride.

Thenceforward he was Wi’s shadow, ready to suffer all things for him,

and even to refrain from sharp words and jests about Aaka or any other

woman upon whom Wi looked with favour, though to do so he must bite a

hole in his tongue. So Pag loved Wi and Wi loved Pag, for which reason

Aaka, who was jealous-hearted, came to hate him more than she had done

at first.

There was trouble about this business of the saving of the life of Pag

by Wi after he had been driven out to starve as an evil-eyed and

scurrilous fellow, but the chief, Henga’s father, a kindly natured

man, when the matter came before him, said that, since twice Pag had

been thrown out and brought back again, it was evident that the gods

meant him to die in some other fashion. Only now that Wi had taken

him, Wi must feed him and see that he hurt none. If he chose to keep a

one-eyed wolf, it was his own business and that of no one else.

Shortly after this, Henga killed his father and became chief in place,

and the matter of Pag was forgotten. So Pag stayed on with Wi and was

beloved of him and by Wi’s children, but hated of Aaka.

“A good pelt,” said Pag, pointing to the wolf with his red knife,

“for, the spring being so late, this beast had not begun to shoot its

hair. When I have brayed it as I know how, it will make a cloak for

Foh. He needs one that is warm, even in the summer, for lately he has

been coughing and spitting.”

“Yes,” answered Wi anxiously. “It has come upon him ever since he hid

in the cold water because the black bear with the great teeth was

after him, knowing that the beast hates water, for which,” he added

viciously, “I swear that I will kill that bear. Also he grieves for

his sister, Fo-a.”

“Aye, Wi,” snarled Pag, his one eye flashing with hate. “Foh grieves,

Aaka grieves, you grieve, and I, Pag the Wolf-man, grieve, too. Oh,

why did you make me come hunting with you that day when my heart was

against it and, smelling evil, I wished to stop with Fo-a, whom Aaka

let run off by herself just because I told her that she should keep

the girl at home?”

“It was the will of the gods, Pag,” muttered Wi, turning his head

away.

“The gods! What gods? I say it was the will of a brute with two legs—

nay, of the great-toothed tiger himself of which our forefather told,

living in a man’s skin, yes, of Henga, helped by Aaka’s temper. Kill

that man tiger, Wi, and never mind the great black bear. Or, if you

cannot, let me. I know a woman who hates him because he has put her

away and made her serve another who has her place, and I can make good

poison, very good poison–-”

“Nay, it is not lawful,” said Wi, “and would bring a curse upon us.

But it is lawful that I should kill him, and I will. I have been

talking to the gods about it.”

“Oh! that is where the wolf’s head has gone—an offering, I see. And

what did the gods say to you, Wi?”

“They gave me a sign. A stone fell from the brow of the ice, as Aaka

said that it would if I was to fight Henga. It nearly hit me, but I

had moved closer to the ice to look at the Sleeper, the greatest of

the gods.”

“I don’t believe it is a god, Wi. I believe it is a beast of a sort we

do not know, dead and frozen, and that the shadow behind it is a man

that was hunting the beast when they both fell into the snow that

turned to ice.”

Wi stared at him, for this indeed was a new idea.

“How can that be, Pag, seeing that the Sleeper and the Shadow have

always been there, for our grandfathers knew them, and there is no

such beast known? Also, except us, there are no other men.”

“Are you sure, Wi? The place is big. If you go to the top of that

hill, you see other hills behind as far as the eye can look, and

between them plains and woods; also, there is the sea, and there may

be beaches beyond the sea. Why, then, should there not be other men?

Did the gods make us alone? Would they not make more to play with and

to kill?”

Wi shook his head at these revolutionary arguments, and Pag went on:

“As for the falling of the stone, it often happens when the heat of

the sun melts the edge of the ice or makes it swell. And as for the

groans and callings of the gods, does not ice crack when the frost is

sharp, or when there is no frost at all and it begins to move of its

own weight?”

“Cease, Pag, cease,” said Wi, stuffing his fingers into his ears. “No

longer will I listen to such mad words. If the gods hear them, they

will kill us.”

“If the people hear them, they may kill us because they walk in fear

of what they cannot see and would save themselves at the cost of

others. But for the gods—that!” and Pag snapped his fingers in the

direction of the glacier, which, after all, is a very ancient gesture

of contempt.

Wi was so overcome that he sat down upon a stone, unable to answer,

and, that first of sceptics, Pag, went on:

“If I must have a god, who have found men quite bad enough to deal

with, without one above them more evil than they, I would choose the

sun. The sun gives life; when the sun shines, everything grows, and

the creatures mate and the birds lay eggs and the seals come to bear

their young and the flowers bloom. When there is no sun only frost and

snow, then all these die or go away, and it is hard to live, and the

wolves and bears raven and eat men, if they can catch them. Yes, the

sun shall be my good god and the black frost my evil god.”

Thus did Pag propound a new religion, which since then has been very

popular in the world. Next, changing the subject rapidly, as do

children and savages, he asked:

“What of Henga, Wi? Are you going to challenge him to fight?”

“Yes,” said Wi fiercely, “this very day.”

“May you be victorious! May you kill him, thus and thus and thus,” and

Pag jabbed his flint knife into the stomach of the dead wolf. “Yet,”

he added reflectively, “it is a big business. There has been no such

man as Henga among our people that I have heard of. Although N’gae,

who calls himself a magician, is without doubt a cheat and a liar, I

think he is right when he says that Henga’s mother made a mistake. She

meant to have twins but they got mixed up together and Henga came

instead. Otherwise, why is he double-jointed, why has he two rows of

teeth, one behind the other, and why is he twice the size of any other

man and more than twice as wicked? Still, without doubt he is a man

and not what you call a god, since he grows fat and heavy and his hair

is beginning to turn gray. Therefore, he can be killed if anyone is

strong enough to break in that thick skull of his. I should like to

try poison on him, but you say that I must not. Well, I will think the

matter over, and we will talk again before you fight. Meanwhile, as

there may be no chance afterward when chattering women are about, give

me your commands, Wi, as to what is to be done if Henga kills you. I

suppose that you do not wish him to take Aaka as he desires to do, or

Foh that he may make a nothing of him and keep him as a slave.”

“I do not,” said Wi.

“Then please direct me to kill them, or to see that they kill

themselves, never mind how.”

“I do so direct you, Pag.”

“Good, and what are your wishes as regards myself?”

“I don’t know,” answered Wi wearily. “Do what you will. I thank you

and wish you well.”

“You are not kind to me, Wi. Although I am called the Twice-thrown-out, and the Wolf-man, and the Hideous, and the Barbed-tongued, still

I have served you well. Now, when I ask you what I must do after you

are dead and I have killed your family, you do not say: ‘Why, follow

me, of course, and look for me in the darkness, and if you find

nothing it will be because there is nothing to find,’ as you would

have done did you love me. No, you say, ‘Do as you will. What is it to

me?’ Still, I shall come with Foh and Aaka, although, of course, I

must be a little behind them, because it will take time to fulfil your

orders, and afterward to do what is necessary to myself. Still, wait

for me an hour, even if Aaka is angry, as she will be.”

“So you think you would find me somewhere, you who do not believe in

the gods,” said Wi, staring at him with his big, melancholy eyes.

“Yes, Wi, I think that, though I don’t know why I think it. I think

that the lover always finds the beloved, and that therefore you will

find Fo-a and I shall find you. Also, I think that, if I am wrong, it

doesn’t matter, for I shall never know that I was wrong. But as for

those gods who dwell in the ice,
piff!
” and again Pag snapped his

fingers in the direction of the glacier and went on with the skinning