Nomads of the North | Page 5

sand-bars and between

pebbly shores. Neewa was sleepless. He had less desire than ever to
waste a glorious afternoon in napping. With his little round eyes he
looked out on a wonderful world, and found it calling to him. He
looked at his mother, and whined. Experience told him that she was
dead to the world for hours to come, unless he tickled her foot or
nipped her ear, and then she would only rouse herself enough to growl
at him. He was tired of that. He yearned for something more exciting,
and with his mind suddenly made up he set off in quest of adventure.
In that big world of green and golden colours he was a little black ball
nearly as wide as he was long. He went down to the creek, and looked
back. He could still see his mother. Then his feet paddled in the soft
white sand of a long bar that edged the shore, and he forgot Noozak. He
went to the end of the bar, and turned up on the green shore where the
young grass was like velvet under his paws. Here he began turning over
small stones for ants. He chased a chipmunk that ran a close and
furious race with him for twenty seconds. A little later a huge
snow-shoe rabbit got up almost under his nose, and he chased that until
in a dozen long leaps Wapoos disappeared in a thicket. Neewa wrinkled
up his nose and emitted a squeaky snarl. Never had Soominitik's blood
run so riotously within him. He wanted to get hold of something. For
the first time in his life he was yearning for a scrap. He was like a small
boy who the day after Christmas has a pair of boxing gloves and no
opponent. He sat down and looked about him querulously, still
wrinkling his nose and snarling defiantly. He had the whole world
beaten. He knew that. Everything was afraid of his mother. Everything
was afraid of HIM. It was disgusting--this lack of something alive for
an ambitious young fellow to fight. After all, the world was rather
tame.
He set off at a new angle, came around the edge of a huge rock, and
suddenly stopped.
From behind the other end of the rock protruded a huge hind paw. For a
few moments Neewa sat still, eyeing it with a growing anticipation.
This time he would give his mother a nip that would waken her for
good! He would rouse her to the beauty and the opportunities of this

day if there was any rouse in him! So he advanced slowly and
cautiously, picked out a nice bare spot on the paw, and sank his little
teeth in it to the gums.
There followed a roar that shook the earth. Now it happened that the
paw did not belong to Noozak, but was the personal property of
Makoos, an old he-bear of unlovely disposition and malevolent temper.
But in him age had produced a grouchiness that was not at all like the
grandmotherly peculiarities of old Noozak. Makoos was on his feet
fairly before Neewa realized that he had made a mistake. He was not
only an old bear and a grouchy bear, but he was also a hater of cubs.
More than once in his day he had committed the crime of cannibalism.
He was what the Indian hunter calls uchan--a bad bear, an eater of his
own kind, and the instant his enraged eyes caught sight of Neewa he let
out another roar.
At that Neewa gathered his fat little legs under his belly and was off
like a shot. Never before in his life had he run as he ran now. Instinct
told him that at last he had met something which was not afraid of him,
and that he was in deadly peril. He made no choice of direction, for
now that he had made this mistake he had no idea where he would find
his mother. He could hear Makoos coming after him, and as he ran he
set up a bawling that was filled with a wild and agonizing prayer for
help. That cry reached the faithful old Noozak. In an instant she was on
her feet--and just in time. Like a round black ball shot out of a gun
Neewa sped past the rock where she had been sleeping, and ten jumps
behind him came Makoos. Out of the corner of his eye he saw his
mother, but his momentum carried him past her. In that moment
Noozak leapt into action. As a football player makes a tackle she
rushed out just in time to catch old Makoos with all her weight full
broadside in the ribs, and the two old bears rolled over and over