Gartok was insensible, and it was a considerable time before he fully recovered consciousness. Then it was found that he could not rise, and that the slightest motion gave him intolerable pain.
“He will die!” exclaimed Anteek, with a look of painful anxiety.
“Yes, he will die if we do not quickly get him home,” said Cheenbuk. “He cannot walk, and he would freeze long before we could make an igloe. I must depend on you now, Anteek. Go back as fast as you can run, and send men with a sledge and skins and something to eat. The boy will remain with me. Away!”
Without a word Anteek leaped up, and, dropping his spear, ran as if his own life depended on his speed. The little boy, who had acted so foolishly, came up with an anxious look on being hailed, but soon forgot himself in his anxiety to be of use to the injured man.
There was a mound of snow within three yards of the spot where the combat had taken place. To the lee side of this Cheenbuk carried Gartok. Being very strong, he was able to lift him tenderly, as if he had been a child, but, despite all his care, the poor man suffered terribly when moved.
It was well that this mound happened to be so close, for a dark cloud which had been overspreading the sky for some time began to send down snow-flakes, and frequent gusts of wind gave indications of an approaching storm. Having placed Gartok in such a position that he was quite sheltered from the wind, Cheenbuk took off his upper seal-skin coat, laid it on the snow, and lifted the injured man on to it. He then wrapped it round him and folded the hood under his head for a pillow, bidding the boy bank up the snow beside him in such a way as to increase the shelter. While thus engaged he saw with some anxiety that Gartok had become deadly pale, and his compressed lips gave the impression that he was suffering much.
“Come here,” said Cheenbuk to the boy quickly; “rub his hands and make them warm.”
The boy obeyed with alacrity, while the other, hastening his movements, began to skin the bear. Being an expert with the knife in such an operation, he was not long of removing the thick-skinned hairy covering from the carcass, and in this, while it was still warm, he wrapped his comrade—not a moment too soon, for, despite the boy’s zealous efforts, the intense cold had taken such hold of the poor man that he was almost unconscious. The warmth of the bearskin, however, restored him a little, and Cheenbuk, sitting down beside him, took his head upon his lap, and tried to shelter him from the storm, which had burst forth and was raging furiously by that time—fine snow filling the atmosphere, while the wind drove it in huge volumes up the valley.
Cheenbuk noted this, and congratulated himself on the fact the wind would favour the progress of the rescue sledge.
Sometimes the whirling snow became so suffocating that the little boy was compelled to cease his labours on the sheltering wall and crouch close to it, while Cheenbuk buried his nose and mouth in the white fur of the bear until the violence of the blasts abated. By keeping the skin well over the face of the wounded man, he succeeded in guarding him from them effectually. But his mind misgave him when he tried to look through the whirling confusion around, and thought of the long tramp that Anteek would have ere he could commence his return journey with the sledge.