“An' when that rescue expedition found me,” Shorty told it in the Annie Mine, “that ornery Cultus George was the first in, beatin' Smoke's sled by three hours, an' don't you forget it, Smoke comes in second at that. Just the same, it was about time, when I heard Cultus George a-yellin' at his dogs from the top of the divide, for those blamed Siwashes had ate my moccasins, my mitts, the leather lacin's, my knife-sheath, an' some of 'em was beginnin' to look mighty hungry at me—me bein' better nourished, you see.
“An' Smoke? He was near dead. He hustled around a while, helpin' to start a meal for them two hundred sufferin' Siwashes; an' then he fell asleep, settin' on his haunches, thinkin' he was feedin' snow into a thawin'-pail. I fixed him my bed, an' dang me if I didn't have to help him into it, he was that give out. Sure I win the toothpicks. Didn't them dogs just naturally need the six salmon Smoke fed 'em at the noonin'?”
IX. THE MISTAKE OF CREATION
“Whoa!” Smoke yelled at the dogs, throwing his weight back on the gee-pole to bring the sled to a halt.
“What's eatin' you now?” Shorty complained. “They ain't no water under that footing.”
“No; but look at that trail cutting out to the right,” Smoke answered. “I thought nobody was wintering in this section.”
The dogs, on the moment they stopped, dropped in the snow and began biting out the particles of ice from between their toes. This ice had been water five minutes before. The animals had broken through a skein of ice, snow-powdered, which had hidden the spring water that oozed out of the bank and pooled on top of the three-foot winter crust of Nordbeska River.
“First I heard of anybody up the Nordbeska,” Shorty said, staring at the all but obliterated track covered by two feet of snow, that left the bed of the river at right angles and entered the mouth of a small stream flowing from the left. “Mebbe they're hunters and pulled their freight long ago.”
Smoke, scooping the light snow away with mittened hands, paused to consider, scooped again, and again paused. “No,” he decided. “There's been travel both ways, but the last travel was up that creek. Whoever they are, they're there now—certain. There's been no travel for weeks. Now what's been keeping them there all the time? That's what I want to know.”