right and went round to the north. They had gone
only a short distance in this direction, when they found fresh reindeer
tracks in the snow. The dogs began to sniff and strain at their
harnesses.
"They smell the game," whispered Kesshoo. "Hold on tight! Don't let
them run."
Menie and Koko held the dogs back as hard as they could. Kesshoo and
Koko's father crept forward with their bows in their hands. The fog was
so thick they could not see very far before them.
They had gone only a short distance, when out of the fog loomed two
great gray shadows. Instantly the two men dropped on their knees and
took careful aim.
The reindeer did not see them. They did not know that anything was near
until they felt the sting of the hunters' arrows. One reindeer dropped
to the earth. The other was not killed. He flung his head in the air
and galloped away, and they could hear the thud, thud, of his hoofs
long after he had disappeared in the fog.
The moment the dogs heard the singing sound of the arrows, they bounded
forward. Koko and Menie were not strong enough to hold them back, and
they could not run fast enough to keep up with them. So they just
bumped along behind the dogs! Some of the time they slid through the
snow.
The snow was rough and hard, and it hurt a good deal to be dragged
through it as if they were sledges, but Eskimo boys are used to bumps,
and they knew if they cried they might scare the game, so they never
even whimpered.
It was lucky for them that they had not far to go. When they came
bumping along, Kesshoo and Koko's father laughed at them.
"Don't be in such a hurry," they called. "There's plenty of time!"
They unbound the traces from Menie and Koko and hitched the dogs to the
body of the reindeer. Then they all started back to the village with
Koko's father driving the dogs.
Soon the fog lifted and the sky grew clear.
Monnie was playing with her doll in the igloo, when she heard Tooky
bark. She knew it was Tooky at once. She and Koolee both plunged into
the tunnel like mice down a mouse hole. Nip and Tup were ahead of them.
Outside they found Koko's mother and the baby. Koolee called to her,
and she called to the wives of the Angakok, who were scraping a bear's
skin in the snow.
The Angakok's wives, and Koko's mother and her baby, and Koolee, and
Monnie, and Nip and Tup all ran to meet the hunters, and you never saw
two prouder boys than Koko and Menie when they showed the reindeer t
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