Taptuna laughed. “He wasn’t strong enough for that, boy. A dozen of him couldn’t do it—but you might have cut the thong.”
“I—I never thought of it!” confessed the brave hunter, feeling no end of a billy goat. “We would have lost the harpoon,” he added, as a sort of excuse for sticking it out.
His father chuckled. He wondered how long the hero would look shamefaced after he met the girls and Guninana.
But before they turned homeward with the story and its proof Kak was to experience his crowning moment. When a hunter kills a bearded seal it is the custom for him to stand up and signal to all the other hunters within sight that they may come and share his prize. The boy was busy loosing Sapsuk from the carcass when his father said:
“You have forgotten something.”
Kak had only once seen an ugrug caught. He looked questioningly at Taptuna.
“There is Hitkoak yonder. He has just settled down to watch his hole. He has not caught anything to-day.”
The Eskimo pointed southward, and then Kak flushed to his ears. “You, father,” he stammered.
“Not a bit of it! You got him.”
The seal killer hesitated a moment, stepped on to his ugrug the better to be seen, and extending his arms at right angles waved the news of his wonderful catch. Hitkoak, far away, looked, rubbed his eyes, and looked again. Surely that short figure could be no other than Kak. What? Kak giving the signal for a bearded seal!