Kazan

Kazan

The Project Gutenberg EBook of Kazan, by James Oliver Curwood
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Title: Kazan
Author: James Oliver Curwood
Release Date: November 14, 2003 [EBook #10084]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
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[Illustration: He heard Joan's voice]
KAZAN
BY JAMES OLIVER CURWOOD

Author of The Danger Trail, Etc.
Illustrated by Gayle Hoskins and Frank Hoffman
1914

CONTENTS
I. THE MIRACLE
II. INTO THE NORTH
III. McCREADY PAYS THE DEBT
IV. FREE FROM BONDS
V. THE FIGHT IN THE SNOW
VI. JOAN
VII. OUT OF THE BLIZZARD
VIII. THE GREAT CHANGE
IX. THE TRAGEDY ON SUN ROCK
X. THE DAYS OF FIRE
XI. ALWAYS TWO BY TWO
XII. THE RED DEATH
XIII. THE TRAIL OF HUNGER
XIV. THE RIGHT OF FANG
XV. A FIGHT UNDER THE STARS

XVI. THE CALL
XVII. HIS SON
XVIII. THE EDUCATION OF BA-REE
XIX. THE USURPERS
XX. A FEUD IN THE WILDERNESS
XXI. A SHOT ON THE SAND-BAR
XXII. SANDY'S METHOD
XXIII. PROFESSOR McGILL
XXIV. ALONE IN DARKNESS
XXV. THE LAST OF McTRIGGER
XXVI. AN EMPTY WORLD
XXVII. THE CALL OF SUN ROCK
CHAPTER I
THE MIRACLE
Kazan lay mute and motionless, his gray nose between his forepaws,
his eyes half closed. A rock could have appeared scarcely less lifeless
than he; not a muscle twitched; not a hair moved; not an eyelid
quivered. Yet every drop of the wild blood in his splendid body was
racing in a ferment of excitement that Kazan had never before
experienced; every nerve and fiber of his wonderful muscles was tense
as steel wire. Quarter-strain wolf, three-quarters "husky," he had lived
the four years of his life in the wilderness. He had felt the pangs of
starvation. He knew what it meant to freeze. He had listened to the
wailing winds of the long Arctic night over the barrens. He had heard
the thunder of the torrent and the cataract, and had cowered under the

mighty crash of the storm. His throat and sides were scarred by battle,
and his eyes were red with the blister of the snows. He was called
Kazan, the Wild Dog, because he was a giant among his kind and as
fearless, even, as the men who drove him through the perils of a frozen
world.
He had never known fear--until now. He had never felt in him before
the desire to run--not even on that terrible day in the forest when he had
fought and killed the big gray lynx. He did not know what it was that
frightened him, but he knew that he was in another world, and that
many things in it startled and alarmed him. It was his first glimpse of
civilization. He wished that his master would come back into the
strange room where he had left him. It was a room filled with hideous
things. There were great human faces on the wall, but they did not
move or speak, but stared at him in a way he had never seen people
look before. He remembered having looked on a master who lay very
quiet and very cold in the snow, and he had sat back on his haunches
and wailed forth the death song; but these people on the walls looked
alive, and yet seemed dead.
Suddenly Kazan lifted his ears a little. He heard steps, then low voices.
One of them was his master's voice. But the other--it sent a little tremor
through him! Once, so long ago that it must have been in his
puppyhood days, he seemed to have had a dream of a laugh that was
like the girl's laugh--a laugh that was all at once filled with a wonderful
happiness, the thrill of a wonderful love, and a sweetness that made
Kazan lift his head as they came in. He looked straight at them, his red
eyes gleaming. At once he knew that she must be dear to his master, for
his master's arm was about her. In the glow of the light he saw that her
hair was very bright, and that there was the color of the crimson
bakneesh vine in her face and the blue of the bakneesh flower in her
shining eyes. Suddenly she saw him, and with a little cry darted toward
him.
"Stop!" shouted the man. "He's dangerous! Kazan--"
She was on her knees beside him, all fluffy and sweet and beautiful, her
eyes shining wonderfully, her hands about to touch