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[Illustration: He heard Joan's voice]
KAZAN
BY JAMES OLIVER CURWOOD
Author of The Danger Trail, Etc.
Illustrated by Gayle Hoskins and Frank Hoffman
1914
CONTENTS
I. THE MIRACLE
II. INTO THE NORTH
III. McCREADY PAYS THE DEBT
IV. FREE FROM BONDS
V. THE FIGHT IN THE SNOW
VI. JOAN
VII. OUT OF THE BLIZZARD
VIII. THE GREAT CHANGE
IX. THE TRAGEDY ON SUN ROCK
X. THE DAYS OF FIRE
XI. ALWAYS TWO BY TWO
XII. THE RED DEATH
XIII. THE TRAIL OF HUNGER
XIV. THE RIGHT OF FANG
XV. A FIGHT UNDER THE STARS
XVI. THE CALL
XVII. HIS SON
XVIII. THE EDUCATION OF BA-REE
XIX. THE USURPERS
XX. A FEUD IN THE WILDERNESS
XXI. A SHOT ON THE SAND-BAR
XXII. SANDY'S METHOD
XXIII. PROFESSOR McGILL
XXIV. ALONE IN DARKNESS
XXV. THE LAST OF McTRIGGER
XXVI. AN EMPTY WORLD
XXVII. THE CALL OF SUN ROCK
CHAPTER I
THE MIRACLE
Kazan lay mute and motionless, his gray nose between his forepaws, his eyes half closed. A rock could have appeared scarcely less lifeless than he; not a muscle twitched; not a hair moved; not an eyelid quivered. Yet every drop of the wild blood in his splendid body was racing in a ferment of excitement that Kazan had never before experienced; every nerve and fiber of his wonderful muscles was tense as steel wire. Quarter-strain wolf, three-quarters "husky," he had lived the four years of his life in the wilderness. He had felt the pangs of starvation. He knew what it meant to freeze. He had listened to the wailing winds of the long Arctic night over the barrens. He had heard the thunder of the torrent and the cataract, and had cowered under the mighty crash of the storm. His throat and sides were scarred by battle, and his eyes were red with the blister of the snows. He was called Kazan, the Wild Dog, because he was a giant among his kind and as fearless, even, as the men who drove him through the perils of a frozen world.
He had never known fear--until now. He had never felt in him before the desire to _run_--not even on that terrible day in the forest when he had fought and killed the big gray lynx. He did not know what it was that frightened him, but he knew that he was in another world, and that many things in it startled and alarmed him. It was his first glimpse of civilization. He wished that his master would come back into the strange room where he had left him. It was a room filled with hideous things. There were great human faces on the wall, but they did not move or speak, but stared at him in a way he had never seen people look before. He remembered having looked on a master who lay very quiet and very cold in the snow, and he had sat back on his haunches and wailed forth the death song; but these people on the walls looked alive, and yet seemed dead.
Table of contents (by pages)
- 1: Kazan by James Oliver Curwood
- 2: Almost sobbingly And you are Kazan dear old Kazan
- 3: He missed the Koosh koosh Hoo yah
- 4: Thorpe found Kazan crouching down at a woman's feet
- 5: And suddenly she smiled at McCready
- 6: And turned his red eyes on McCready
- 7: And McCready jerked himself erect
- 8: McCready sprang back just in time
- 9: McCready pointed into the thick spruce
- 10: He watched McCready as he entered
- 11: Working his way on his belly toward the packed sledge
- 12: H o o o o Kazan Kazan Kazan
- 13: The Mackenzie was a thousand miles away
- 14: But Kazan sat quiet and trembling
- 15: With Kazan half under her body
- 16: But Kazan and the wolf were still
- 17: Nor the perfume of the balsam and spruce
- 18: And suddenly Kazan saw something glisten in the man's hands
- 19: Kazan urged Gray Wolf to her feet
- 20: But Kazan drove straight ahead
- 21: Kazan and Gray Wolf were alone out on the plain
- 22: And Pierre Radisson followed it
- 23: And three times Kazan felt the touch of it
- 24: Kazan lifted his head and whined
- 25: And then dropped down on her knees beside Kazan
- 26: And then fastened Kazan in the traces again
- 27: And when Kazan heard her again
- 28: Kazan was huddled in a round ball
- 29: And Kazan pulled the sledge alone
- 30: And Kazan dragged the sledge alone
- 31: After that Kazan heard her sobbing
- 32: And they began calling him Kazan
- 33: And sometimes nip Kazan lightly to show her displeasure
- 34: But the wolf that was in Kazan
- 35: Had heretofore kept him from fatherhood
- 36: I guess that's why I love Kazan next to you and the baby
- 37: And which even a jugular hold could not stop
- 38: That told Kazan what had happened
- 39: Still holding the babiche thong
- 40: He in turn had killed the lynx
- 41: Then Kazan would take the leap
- 42: Kazan came to Gray Wolf's side
- 43: And he found them in abundance along the Waterfound
- 44: He told Weyman about it their first night
- 45: Where North Battleford now stands
- 46: Then he explained his scheme to Weyman
- 47: The lynx flung out its free hindfoot
- 48: Henri and Weyman were out early
- 49: And Kazan was not afraid of him
- 50: Kazan had lured her back to a trap line
- 51: Those same senses became less active in Kazan
- 52: At these times Kazan always watched her
- 53: Leaving Gray Wolf in the windfall
- 54: By midnight Kazan was back under the windfall
- 55: Kazan was hunting listlessly now
- 56: Kazan and Gray Wolf were quivering
- 57: Kazan knew better than to attack openly again
- 58: Kazan sprang for a throat hold
- 59: While Kazan stood rigid and listening
- 60: With Kazan quivering and listening beside her
- 61: Gray Wolf slunk closer to Kazan
- 62: His ears were flattened as he watched Kazan
- 63: But Kazan was among his own kind
- 64: Kazan and his mates going fearlessly in the trail
- 65: Air holes beeg white cariboo oo oo
- 66: With lightning swiftness Kazan returned the cut
- 67: Rising clear and unforgetable above all others
- 68: Kazan had heard that sound before
- 69: At last Kazan halted before Gray Wolf
- 70: But he did not leave the windfall
- 71: For half an hour Kazan did not move
- 72: She caressed Ba ree with her tongue
- 73: Farther and farther Ba ree ventured from the windfall
- 74: Neither Gray Wolf nor Kazan was deeply interested in beavers
- 75: Broken Tooth was marshaling his family
- 76: The beavers pushing them with their heads and forepaws
- 77: Kazan came to the end of the dam
- 78: And at last Kazan plunged in and swam across
- 79: Kazan was pulled completely under
- 80: They forgot Kazan and Gray Wolf
- 81: In two leaps Kazan was upon him
- 82: While Kazan made his stealthy advance
- 83: One of these late comers was Sandy McTrigger
- 84: Five minutes after her warning howl Kazan stood at her side
- 85: Kazan heard the sound and stopped drinking to face it
- 86: Holding the end of the babiche
- 87: The third time he prodded Kazan with it
- 88: Untying the babiche he dragged the dog to the canoe
- 89: McTrigger did not beat him now
- 90: Jeering taunts flung at McTrigger and Harker
- 91: That was keeping Kazan from her
- 92: The smell of Kazan was strong about her
- 93: She reasoned that she must find Kazan
- 94: Sandy McTrigger had come up quietly behind him
- 95: And his answer roused McGill from deep sleep
- 96: From out of the banskians behind the tent
- 97: And he slipped through the banskians like a shadow
- 98: Kazan remained a slinking creature of the big swamp
- 99: It seems that Kazan left us here
- 100: Kazan and Gray Wolf hunted again in the moonlit plain
