For the Love of a ManWhen John Thornton froze his feet in the previous December hispartners had made him comfortable and left him to get well, going onthemselves up the river to get out a raft of saw-logs for Dawson. Hewas still limping slightly at the time he rescued Buck, but with thecontinued warm weather even the slight limp left him. And here, lyingby the river bank through the long spring days, watching the runningwater, listening lazily to the songs of birds and the hum of nature, Buckslowly won back his strength.
A rest comes very good after one has travelled three thousand miles,and it must be confessed that Buck waxed lazy as his wounds healed, hismuscles swelled out, and the flesh came back to cover his bones. Forthat matter, they were all loafing,--Buck, John Thornton, and Skeet andNig,--waiting for the raft to come that was to carry them down toDawson. Skeet was a little Irish setter who early made friends withBuck, who, in a dying condition, was unable to resent her first advances.
She had the doctor trait which some dogs possess; and as a mother catwashes her kittens, so she washed and cleansed Buck's wounds.
Regularly, each morning after he had finished his breakfast, sheperformed her self- appointed task, till he came to look for herministrations as much as he did for Thornton's. Nig, equally friendly,though less demonstrative, was a huge black dog, half bloodhound andhalf deerhound, with eyes that laughed and a boundless good nature.
To Buck's surprise these dogs manifested no jealousy toward him.
They seemed to share the kindliness and largeness of John Thornton.
As Buck grew stronger they enticed him into all sorts of ridiculousgames, in which Thornton himself could not forbear to join; and in thisfashion Buck romped through his convalescence and into a newexistence. Love, genuine passionate love, was his for the first time.
This he had never experienced at Judge Miller's down in the sun-kissedSanta Clara Valley. With the Judge's sons, hunting and tramping, it hadbeen a working partnership; with the Judge's grandsons, a sort ofpompous guardianship; and with the Judge himself, a stately anddignified friendship. But love that was feverish and burning, that wasadoration, that was madness, it had taken John Thornton to arouse.
This man had saved his life, which was something; but, further, hewas the ideal master. Other men saw to the welfare of their dogs froma sense of duty and business expediency; he saw to the welfare of his asif they were his own children, because he could not help it. And he sawfurther. He never forgot a kindly greeting or a cheering word, and to sitdown for a long talk with them ("gas" he called it) was as much hisdelight as theirs. He had a way of taking Buck's head roughly betweenhis hands, and resting his own head upon Buck's, of shaking him backand forth, the while calling him ill names that to Buck were love names.
Buck knew no greater joy than that rough embrace and the sound ofmurmured oaths, and at each jerk back and forth it seemed that his heartwould be shaken out of his body so great was its ecstasy. And when,released, he sprang to his feet, his mouth laughing, his eyes eloquent, histhroat vibrant with unuttered sound, and in that fashion remainedwithout movement, John Thornton would reverently exclaim, "God! you can all but speak!"Buck had a trick of love expression that was akin to hurt. He wouldoften seize Thornton's hand in his mouth and close so fiercely that theflesh bore the impress of his teeth for some time afterward. And asBuck understood the oaths to be love words, so the man understood thisfeigned bite for a caress.
For the most part, however, Buck's love was expressed in adoration.
While he went wild with happiness when Thornton touched him orspoke to him, he did not seek these tokens. Unlike Skeet, who waswont to shove her nose under Thornton's hand and nudge and nudge tillpetted, or Nig, who would stalk up and rest his great head on Thornton'sknee, Buck was content to adore at a distance. He would lie by thehour, eager, alert, at Thornton's feet, looking up into his face, dwellingupon it, studying it, following with keenest interest each fleetingexpression, every movement or change of feature. Or, as chance mighthave it, he would lie farther away, to the side or rear, watching theoutlines of the man and the occasional movements of his body. Andoften, such was the communion in which they lived, the strength ofBuck's gaze would draw John Thornton's head around, and he wouldreturn the gaze, without speech, his heart shining out of his eyes asBuck's heart shone out.
For a long time after his rescue, Buck did not like Thornton to getout of his sight. From the moment he left the tent to when he entered itagain, Buck would follow at his heels. His transient masters since he hadcome into the Northland had bred in him a fear that no master could bepermanent. He was afraid that Thornton would pass out of his life asPerrault and Francois and the Scotch half-breed had passed out. Evenin the night, in his dreams, he was haunted by this fear. At such timeshe would shake off sleep and creep through the chill to the flap of thetent, where he would stand and listen to the sound of his master's breathing.
But in spite of this great love he bore John Thornton, which seemedto bespeak the soft civilizing influence, the strain of the primitive, whichthe Northland had aroused in him, remained alive and active.
Faithfulness and devotion, things born of fire and roof, were his; yet heretained his wildness and wiliness. He was a thing of the wild, come infrom the wild to sit by John Thornton's fire, rather than a dog of the softSouthland stamped with the marks of generations of civilization.
Because of his very great love, he could not steal from this man, butfrom any other man, in any other camp, he did not hesitate an instant;while the cunning with which he stole enabled him to escape detection.
His face and body were scored by the teeth of many dogs, and hefought as fiercely as ever and more shrewdly. Skeet and Nig were toogood-natured for quarrelling,--besides, they belonged to John Thornton;but the strange dog, no matter what the breed or valor, swiftlyacknowledged Buck's supremacy or found himself struggling for lifewith a terrible antagonist. And Buck was merciless. He had learnedwell the law of club and fang, and he never forewent an advantage ordrew back from a foe he had started on the way to Death. He hadlessoned from Spitz, and from the chief fighting dogs of the police andmail, and knew there was no middle course. He must master or bemastered; while to show mercy was a weakness. Mercy did not exist inthe primordial life. It was misunderstood for fear, and suchmisunderstandings made for death. Kill or be killed, eat or be eaten,was the law; and this mandate, down out of the depths of Time, he obeyed.
He was older than the days he had seen and the breaths he had drawn.
He linked the past with the present, and the eternity behind him throbbedthrough him in a mighty rhythm to which he swayed as the tides andseasons swayed. He sat by John Thornton's fire, a broad-breasted dog,white-fanged and long-furred; but behind him were the shades of allmanner of dogs, half-wolves and wild wolves, urgent and prompting,tasting the savor of the meat he ate, thirsting for the water he drank,scenting the wind with him, listening with him and telling him thesounds made by the wild life in the forest, dictating his moods, directinghis actions, lying down to sleep with him when he lay down, anddreaming with him and beyond him and becoming themselves the stuffof his dreams.
So peremptorily did these shades beckon him, that each day mankindand the claims of mankind slipped farther from him. Deep in the forest acall was sounding, and as often as he heard this call, mysteriouslythrilling and luring, he felt compelled to turn his back upon the fire andthe beaten earth around it, and to plunge into the forest, and on and on,he knew not where or why; nor did he wonder where or why, the callsounding imperiously, deep in the forest. But as often as he gained thesoft unbroken earth and the green shade, the love for John Thorntondrew him back to the fire again.
Thornton alone held him. The rest of mankind was as nothing.
Chance travellers might praise or pet him; but he was cold under it all,and from a too demonstrative man he would get up and walk away.
When Thornton's partners, Hans and Pete, arrived on the long-expectedraft, Buck refused to notice them till he learned they were close toThornton; after that he tolerated them in a passive sort of way, acceptingfavors from them as though he favored them by accepting. They wereof the same large type as Thornton, living close to the earth, thinkingsimply and seeing clearly; and ere they swung the raft into the big eddyby the saw- mill at Dawson, they understood Buck and his ways, and didnot insist upon an intimacy such as obtained with Skeet and Nig.
For Thornton, however, his love seemed to grow and grow. He,alone among men, could put a pack upon Buck's back in the summertravelling. Nothing was too great for Buck to do, when Thorntoncommanded. One day (they had grub-staked themselves from theproceeds of the raft and left Dawson for the head-waters of the Tanana)the men and dogs were sitting on the crest of a cliff which fell away,straight down, to naked bed-rock three hundred feet below. JohnThornton was sitting near the edge, Buck at his shoulder. A thoughtlesswhim seized Thornton, and he drew the attention of Hans and Pete to theexperiment he had in mind. "Jump, Buck!" he commanded, sweepinghis arm out and over the chasm. The next instant he was grapplingwith Buck on the extreme edge, while Hans and Pete were draggingthem back into safety.
"It's uncanny," Pete said, after it was over and they had caught their speech.
Thornton shook his head. "No, it is splendid, and it is terrible, too.
Do you know, it sometimes makes me afraid.""I'm not hankering to be the man that lays hands on you while he'saround," Pete announced conclusively, nodding his head toward Buck.
"Py Jingo!" was Hans's contribution. "Not mineself either."It was at Circle City, ere the year was out, that Pete's apprehensionswere realized. "Black" Burton, a man evil-tempered and malicious,had been picking a quarrel with a tenderfoot at the bar, when Thorntonstepped good-naturedly between. Buck, as was his custom, was lyingin a corner, head on paws, watching his master's every action. Burtonstruck out, without warning, straight from the shoulder. Thornton wassent spinning, and saved himself from falling only by clutching the railof the bar.
Those who were looking on heard what was neither bark nor yelp,but a something which is best described as a roar, and they saw Buck'sbody rise up in the air as he left the floor for Burton's throat. The mansaved his life by instinctively throwing out his arm, but was hurledbackward to the floor with Buck on top of him. Buck loosed his teethfrom the flesh of the arm and drove in again for the throat. This timethe man succeeded only in partly blocking, and his throat was torn open.
Then the crowd was upon Buck, and he was driven off; but while asurgeon checked the bleeding, he prowled up and down, growlingfuriously, attempting to rush in, and being forced back by an array ofhostile clubs. A "miners' meeting," called on the spot, decided that thedog had sufficient provocation, and Buck was discharged. But hisreputation was made, and from that day his name spread through everycamp in Alaska.
Later on, in the fall of the year, he saved John Thornton's life in quiteanother fashion. The three partners were lining a long and narrowpoling-boat down a bad stretch of rapids on the Forty- Mile Creek. Hansand Pete moved along the bank, snubbing with a thin Manila rope fromtree to tree, while Thornton remained in the boat, helping its descent bymeans of a pole, and shouting directions to the shore. Buck, on thebank, worried and anxious, kept abreast of the boat, his eyes never offhis master.
At a particularly bad spot, where a ledge of barely submerged rocksjutted out into the river, Hans cast off the rope, and, while Thorntonpoled the boat out into the stream, ran down the bank with the end in hishand to snub the boat when it had cleared the ledge. This it did, andwas flying down-stream in a current as swift as a mill-race, when Hanschecked it with the rope and checked too suddenly. The boat flirtedover and snubbed in to the bank bottom up, while Thornton, flung sheerout of it, was carried down-stream toward the worst part of the rapids, astretch of wild water in which no swimmer could live.
Buck had sprung in on the instant; and at the end of three hundredyards, amid a mad swirl of water, he overhauled Thornton. When hefelt him grasp his tail, Buck headed for the bank, swimming with all hissplendid strength. But the progress shoreward was slow; the progressdown-stream amazingly rapid. From below came the fatal roaringwhere the wild current went wilder and was rent in shreds and spray bythe rocks which thrust th............