Red Rooney: The Last of the Crew by R. M. Ballantyne (free e books to read .txt) 📕
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- Author: R. M. Ballantyne
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To this narrative the natives listened with breathless attention, but at the conclusion Okiok looked at the extended hand in surprise, not knowing what was expected of him. Seeing this, Rooney leaned forward, grasped the man’s right hand, shook it warmly, patted it on the back, then, raising it to his lips, kissed it.
Stupid indeed would the man have been, and unusually savage, who could have failed to understand that friendship and good-will lay in these actions. But Okiok was not stupid. On the contrary, he was brightly intelligent, and, being somewhat humorous in addition, he seized Rooney’s hand instantly after, and repeated the operation, with a broad smile on his beaming face. Then, turning suddenly to Tumbler, he grasped and shook that naked infant’s hand, as it sat on the floor in a pool of oil from a lamp which it had overturned.
An explosion of laughter from everybody showed that the little joke was appreciated; but Okiok became suddenly grave, and sobered his family instantly, as he turned to Rooney and said—
“I wish that Angut had been there. He would have saved your big oomiak and all the men.”
“Indeed. Is he then such a powerful angekok?”
“Yes; very, very powerful. There never was an angekok like him.”
“I suppose not,” returned Rooney, with a feeling of doubt, which, however, he took care to hide. “What like is this great wise man—very big, I suppose?”
“No, he is not big, but he is not small. He is middling, and very strong, like the bear; very active and supple, like the seal or the white fox; and very swift, like the deer—and very different from other angekoks.”
“He must be a fine man,” said the sailor, becoming interested in this angekok; “tell me wherein he differs from others.”
“He is not only strong and wise, but he is good; and he cares nothing for our customs, or for the ways of other angekoks. He says that they are all lies and nonsense. Yes, he even says that he is not an angekok at all; but we know better, for he is. Everybody can see that he is. He knows everything; he can do anything. Do I not speak what is true?”
He turned to his wife and daughter as he spoke. Thus appealed to, Nuna said it was all true, and Nunaga said it was all very true, and blushed—and, really, for an Eskimo, she looked quite pretty.
Don’t laugh, good reader, at the idea of an Eskimo blushing. Depend upon it, that that is one of those touches of nature which prove the kinship of the world everywhere.
While they were talking a step was heard outside, and the Eskimos looked intelligently at each other. They knew that the comer must be a friend, because, had he been a stranger, the dogs would have given notice of his approach. Besides, these animals were heard fawning round him as he spoke to them.
“Ujarak!” exclaimed Okiok, in a low voice.
“Is Ujarak a friend?” asked the sailor.
“He is an angekok,” said the Eskimo evasively—“a great angekok, but not so great as Angut.”
Another moment, and a man was seen to creep into the tunnel. Standing up when inside, he proved to be a tall, powerful Eskimo, with a not unhandsome but stern countenance, which was somewhat marred by a deep scar over the left eye.
Of course Ujarak, wise man though he was esteemed to be, could not help being struck dumb by the unexpected sight of the gaunt foreigner. Indeed, having so long held supposed intercourse with familiar spirits, it is not improbable that he imagined that one of them had at last come, without waiting for a summons, to punish him because of his deceptive practices, for he turned pale—or rather faintly green—and breathed hard.
Perceiving his state, it suddenly occurred to the sailor to say—“Don’t be afraid. I won’t hurt you.” He inadvertently said it in English, however, so that Ujarak was none the wiser.
“Who is he?” demanded the angekok—perhaps it were more correct to call him wizard.
Okiok, expecting Rooney to reply, looked at him, but a spirit of silence seemed to have come over the stranger, for he made no reply, but shut his eyes, as if he had dropped asleep.
“He is a Kablunet,” said Okiok.
“I could see that, even if I had not the double sight of the angekok,” replied the other, with a touch of sarcasm, for Eskimos, although by no means addicted to quarrelling, are very fond of satire. They are also prone to go straight to the point in conversation, and although fond of similes and figurative language, they seldom indulge in bombast.
With much solemnity Okiok rejoined that he had no doubt of Ujarak’s being aware that the man was a Kablunet.
“And I am glad you have come,” he added, “for of course you can also tell me where the Kablunet has come from, and whither he is going?”
The angekok glanced at his host quickly, for he knew—at least he strongly suspected—that he was one of that uncomfortable class of sceptics who refuse to swallow without question all that self-constituted “wise men” choose to tell them. Okiok was gazing at him, however, with an air of the most infantine simplicity and deference.
“I cannot tell you that,” replied the wizard, “because I have not consulted my torngak about him.”
It must be explained here that each angekok has a private spirit, or familiar, whose business it is to enlighten him on all points, and conduct him on his occasional visits to the land of spirits. This familiar is styled his “torngak.”
“Did your torngak tell you that he was a Kablunet?” asked Okiok simply—so simply that there was no room for Ujarak to take offence.
“No; my eyes told me that.”
“I did not know that you had ever seen a Kablunet,” returned the other, with a look of surprise.
“Nor have I. But have I not often heard them described by the men of the south? and has not my torngak showed them to me in dreams?”
The wizard said this somewhat tartly, and Okiok, feeling that he had gone far enough, turned away his sharp little eyes, and gazed at the lamp-smoke with an air of profound humility.
“You have got seal-flesh?” said Ujarak, glad to change the subject.
“Yes; I killed it yesterday. You are hungry? Nuna will give you some.”
“No; I am not hungry. Nevertheless I will eat. It is good to eat at all times.”
“Except when we are stuffed quite full,” murmured Okiok, casting at Nunaga a sly glance, which threw that Eskimo maiden into what strongly resembled a suppressed giggle. It was catching, for her brothers Norrak and Ermigit were thrown into a similar condition, and even the baby crowed out of sympathy. Indeed Red Rooney himself, who only simulated sleep, found it difficult to restrain his feelings, for he began to understand Okiok’s character, and to perceive that he was more than a match for the wizard with all his wisdom.
Whatever Ujarak may have felt, he revealed nothing, for he possessed that well-known quality of the Eskimo—the power to restrain and conceal his feelings—in a high degree. With a quiet patronising smile, he bent down in quite a lover-like way, and asked Nunaga if the seal-flesh was good.
“Yes, it is good; very good,” answered the maiden, looking modestly down, and toying with the end of her tail. You see she had no scent-bottle or fan to toy with. To be sure she had gloves—thick sealskin mittens—but these were not available at the moment.
“I knew you had a seal,” said the angekok, pausing between bites, after the edge of his appetite had been taken off; “my torngak told me you had found one at last.”
“Did he tell you that I had also found a bear?” asked Okiok, with deeper simplicity than ever.
The wizard, without raising his head, and stuffing his mouth full to prevent the power of speech, glanced keenly about the floor. Observing the fresh skin in a corner, and one or two ribs, he bolted the bite, and said—
“O yes. My torngak is kind; he tells me many things without being asked. He said to me two days ago, ‘Okiok is a clever man. Though all the people are starving just now, he has killed a seal and a bear.’”
“Can torngaks make mistakes?” asked Okiok, with a puzzled look. “It was yesterday that I killed the seal and the bear.”
“Torngaks never make mistakes,” was the wizard’s prompt and solemn reply; “but they see and know the future as well as the past, and they sometimes speak of both as the present.”
“How puzzling!” returned the other meekly. “He meant you, then, to understand that I was going to kill a seal and a bear. Glad am I that I am not an angekok, for it would be very difficult work for a stupid man,—enough almost to kill him!”
“You are right. It is difficult and hard work. So you see the torngak told me go feast with Okiok, and at his bidding of course I have come, on purpose to do so.”
“That’s a lie. You came to see my Nunaga, and you hope to get her; but you never will!” said Okiok. He said it only to himself, however, being far too polite to say it to his guest, to whom he replied deferentially—
“If they are starving at your village, why did you not bring your mother and your father? They would have been welcome, for a seal and a bear would be enough to stuff us all quite full, and leave something to send to the rest.”
For some minutes the wizard did not reply. Perhaps he was meditating, perchance inventing.
“I brought no one,” he said at last, “because I want you and your family to return with me to the village. You know it is only two days distant, and we can take the seal and the bear with us. We are going to have a great feast and games.”
“Did you not say the people were starving?” asked Okiok, with a look of gentle surprise.
“They
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