“It isn’t the Eskimos that are killing the seals off,” remarked Billy wisely. “They’re leaving that to us, who live farther south and don’t need the fur or anything about ’em, really. The Eskimos do need to kill ’em or starve and freeze themselves.”
Although the boys were eager to find Mooloo, they by no means wasted the rest of that day.
They wandered about the strange, fascinating, snow-covered land, regarding the dome-shaped igloos with an interest that never grew less, stumbling at last into an old stone hut which showed its deserted state in every dejected nook and cranny of it.
“Wonder why there’s no one living here,” said Mouser, as the lads wandered about the place. “You see plenty of snow houses around, but I should think a place like this would be lots more comfortable.”
They put this question to Kapje some time later when, driven by the pangs of hunger and a desire to thaw out their noses, they returned to the igloo.
The man, seemingly disgruntled at the failure of the hunt that morning, was sitting before the fire, a frown on his heavily creased face.
His wife, who was again stirring a delectable smelling mixture over the oil stove, gave them her broad grin.
In answer to Bobby’s question of why the Eskimos built snow igloos when there were perfectly good stone houses going to waste, the native merely grunted and shrugged his shoulders.
“Eskimo like igloo best,” he answered. “Time come move along, leave snow house, build another. No move stone house.
“Up there,” he added, after a short silence, waving his hand in a generally northern direction, “Eskimo use stone house. Down here he like igloo.”