Then Wi said to Pag:
"I thought that we must leave the pit unbaited and try to drive the wolves into it as best we could, but it is not so, for the gods have been good to us."
"Yes," said Pag, "the bears have been very good to us, and for aught I know the gods may be bears, or the bears gods."
Then he sent to summon all the men of the tribe before the exposed flesh turned to solid ice. They camescores of them, many with hide ropes which they made fast to great lumps of meat, and others with rough reedwoven baskets. Setting to work, before night fell they had carried tons of the flesh into the rock pit, which was round and may have measured a hundred paces from side to side, where they left it to freeze so that the wolves could not drag it away, or eat it easily.
That night, watching by the moonlight, they saw and heard many wolves gathered at the mouth of the pit and walking to and fro, filled with doubt and fear of raps. At last some enteredthough only a very few of themand were suffered to go away unhindered when they had gorged themselves. Next night more entered, and next night more, though now they could make small play with the flesh because the frost had turned it into stone. On the fourth day, Wi called up the tribe and, before sunset, sent all the younger man, led by Moananga, into the woods, making a great halfcircle round those places where they knew the wolves had their lairs, ordering them to hide there, several together, so that they might not be attacked, and not to stir till they saw a fire burn upon a certain rock. Then, with shoutings, they were to advance, driving all the wolves before them toward the mouth of the gorge.
So the men went, for now they knew that either they must conquer the wolves or the wolves would conquer them.
Then it was that Pag behaved very strangely, for after these man had started, he said:
"This plan is of no use, Wi, for when the wolves hear the shoutings they will not run toward the gorge, but will break and scatter by ones and twos, this way and that, slipping through the drivers or round the ends of the line before it closes."
"If you think that, why did you not say so before?" asked Wi angrily.
"For my own reasons. Hearken, Wi. All the women call me a wolfman, do they not, one who changes into a wolf and hunts with the wolves. Well, that is a lie, and yet there is truth mixed up with this lie. You know that, soon after I was born, my mother cast, or caused me to be cast, out into the forest where she was sure the wolves would eat me, but afterward my father found me and brought me back. What you do not know is that this was ten days from the time when I was cast out. Now, how did I live during those days? I cannot tell you who have no memory, but I hold that some wolf suckled me, since otherwise I must have died."
"I have heard of such things," said Wi doubtfully, "but always set them down as winterfire tales. But why do you think this one to be true? Perchance your father found you the day that you were cast out."
"I think it to be true because, in after time, when she was dying, my mother whispered this tale into my ears. She said my father, who himself was killed by wolves not long afterward, told her secretly for he dared not speak of the matter openlythat when he came upon me in the forest whither he had gone to seek my bones and, if any of them could be found, bury them, he discovered me in such a nest as wolves make when they bear their young, and saw a great gray wolf standing over me with her teat in my mouth, one that had lost her cubs, mayhap. She growled at him but ran away, and seizing me, he also ran and bore me home. This my mother swore to me."
"A dying woman's fancy," said Wi.
"I think not," answered Pag, "and for this reason. When for the second time I was driven out by the women, or rather by Henga's father, whom they persuaded that I was a bewitcher and unlucky, having nowhere else to go and all hands being against me, I wandered into the woods that there the wolves might kill me and make an end. The day began to die, and presently wolves gathered round me, for I saw them moving between the tree trunks, waiting till night fell to spring upon me. I watched them idly, caring nothing, since I had come there to be their meat. They drew near when suddenly a great gray shewolf ran up as though to seize me, then stopped and sniffed at me.
"Thrice she smelt, then licked me with her tongue, and leaping round, rushed at those other wolves, snarling and openjawed, her fur starting up from her back. The dogwolves ran away from her, but two of the shewolves stood, being hungry. With these she fought, tearing the throat out of one and mauling the other so that it limped off howling. Then she, too, went away, leaving me amazed till I remembered my mother's story, after which I wondered no more, being sure that this old wolf was she that had suckled me and knew me again."
"Did you see more of her, Pag?"
"Aye. Twice she returned, once after five days, and once after six more days, and each time she brought me meat and laid it at my feet. It was filthy carrion torn from some dead deer that she had dug up from beneath the snow, but doubtless the best she could find. Moreover, although she was thin with hunger and this was her portion, still she brought it to me."
"And did you eat it?" asked Wi, astonished.
"Nay, why should I who had crept into that hole to die? Moreover, my stomach turned at the sight of it. Then you found me and carried me into your hut, and I have met that foster mother of mine no more. Yet she still lives, for more than once I have seen her; yes, this very winter I have seen her who now is the leader of all the wolf people."
"A strange story," said Wi, staring at him. "Surely if you have not dreamed it, you who slay many of them should be more tender toward wolves."
"Not so, for did they not kill my father, and would they not have killed me? Yet to this wolf I am tender, as I shall show you, for in payment of what I would do, I ask her life."
"And what would you do?" asked Wi.
"This. Now, before the fire is lighted, I will go down into the forest and find that wolf, for she will know me again and come to me. Then, when the shouting begins and the brutes grow frightened, she will follow me and the all the other wolves will follow her, and I shall lead them thither into the trap. Only her I will save from the trap, for that is my bargain."
"You are mad," said Wi.
"If I come back no more, then call me mad, or if my plan fail. But if I live and it succeeds, then call me wise," answered Pag with a low guttural laugh. "There is yet an hour before the lighting of the fire when the edge of the moon covers yonder star. Give me that hour and you shall learn."
Then, without waiting for more words, Pag slipped down the rock on which they were standing and vanished into the gloom.
"Without doubt he is mad," said Wi to himself, "and without doubt this is the end of our fellowship."
Presently, waiting there in the cold frost and watching his breath steam upon the still air, Wi's mind went back to this matter of Pag. Now that he came to think of it, it was very strange that all the people believed Pag to be a companion of wolves. What was accepted by all, he had noted, was generally true. If one person smelt a fox, he might be mistaken, but if everybody smelt it, surely there was a fox. It was certain also that Pag never had any fear of wolves and would go down into the forest when they were howling all around as quietly as another would walk into his hut and take no harm; whereas from bears or other wild beasts he would run like the rest.
Further, now Wi remembered having heard the tale told in his youth that, when Pag was cast out by his mother shortly after birth, for some reason that he forgot, fifteen days went by before his father went to seek his bones to bury them. Yet he found him living and strong, because of whichso ran the talethe people held Pag to be not human but a monster sprung from one of those evil spirits that might be heard howling round the huts at the dead of night.
So perhaps what Pag said was true. Perhaps his father had found him in a wolf's den and seen her suckling him. Perhaps, too, since these beasts were known to live many years, especially if the spirit of a dead man were in them, as Urk and other aged ones declared happened from time to time both in the case of wolves and of other creatures, such as the great toothed tiger, food had been brought to him by that same wolf when he was cast out for the second time.
Well, he would learn presently; meanwhile, the moment drew near when he must light the signal fire.
A while later, Wi looked at the moon and saw that the star was vanishing in the light of its edge. Then he whispered to Foh who now had come to him and crouched at his side, watching all things eagerly as a boy does. Foh nodded and slipped away, to return presently with a smouldering brand that he had brought from a little fire which was burning out of sight farther down the hillside.
Wi took it and went to the pile of dried wood that had been prepared upon the rock, where he blew it to a flame and set it among some powdered seaweed at the base of the pile. The seaweed caught readily, as this sort does when dry, giving out a blue light, and presently the pile was aflame. Then Wi bade Foh go home to the cave, which he pretended to do but did not, for, desiring above all things to see this great wolf hunt, he hid himself away behind a rock.
Wi took it and went to the pile of dried wood that had been prepared upon the rock, where he blew it to a flame and set it among some powdered seaweed at the base of the pile. The seaweed caught readily, as this sort does when dry, giving out a blue light, and presently the pile was aflame. Then Wi bade Foh go home to the cave, which he pretended to do but did not, for, desiring above all things to see this great wolf hunt, he hid himself away behind a rock.
Thinking that Foh had departed, Wi crept down to where the old men, to the number of fifty or more under the command of Hotoa the Slow speeched, lay hidden among the stones, down wind so that the wolves might not smell them, and near to the mouth of the gully that, save for a gap in the middle, was built up with a wall of snowcovered boulders, as has been told. These men he bade be ready, and when the wolves had gone through the gap and they heard his command, but not before, to rush forward, each of them carrying a large stone, and fill up the gap so that the wolves could not come out again. Meanwhile, they must keep stirring the stones lest the frost should fasten them to the ground.