Akpek was eager enough to go. That day he was glad to join in any game suggested by his wonderful cousin; for Taptuna had not been able to resist bragging about his son’s hunting, and the story of the ugrug sounded quite different and terribly impressive when told among the grown-ups. Hearing his father congratulate Kak, and his mother praise him, made the other boy feel pretty small and mean about his boasting of bear hunting the night before; and now he shyly endeavored to make up to his chum for having doubted him.
The boys started off shouting and running races, each anxious to get to the rough ice first and claim the highest hummock for his house. This was a dandy new play and a dandy place to play it. American boys would doubtless have called the game “Castles” for the shining pinnacles and spires of the ice blocks made splendid towers, and the whole mass looked so handsome shimmering in bright sunshine under a cloudless sky, its arms uplifted into the blue, and twinkling all over with a sort of frosted Christmas card effect, it really deserved a magnificent name. But Kak and Akpek had never heard of castles, nor indeed any building finer than the dance hall of the day before, so they were quite content to talk about playing at “high houses.”
Bursts of speed and rollicking noise both stopped when they struck the rough ice and needed their breath for climbing. From there they went as quietly as hunters, till they had each crested the top of a large cake; then rivalry broke loose.
“I’m above you! Mine is the highest!” Kak cried exultantly, swinging his sealskin boots over the edge of a precipice. But even while he chortled in his glory, Akpek spied a higher peak, and swarming down from his first choice without a word of warning, shinned up the second.
“Yo-ho, there!” he crowed from what was really a daring, difficult perch. “Who said you were on a high house? Look at me!”
“Foxes!” yelled Kak, all his pride gone in a minute. “Come down out of that. Don’t you know I’ve got to be on top because it’s my game!”
But Akpek only jeered.
Then our hero started up furiously to pull his cousin down; and Akpek came laughing, for he was always good-natured, and although a tall lad and a good climber, not at all sorry to be off that slippery ice arm.
“Leave it alone,” he advised. “It’s a beggar!”
“You believe I can climb it?” Kak asked.