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+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 77051 ***
+
+
+
+
+
+  BOOKS BY
+  NICHOLAS KALASHNIKOFF
+
+  The Defender
+  Toyon: A Dog of the North and His People
+  Jumper: The Life of a Siberian Horse
+  They That Take the Sword
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+  THE DEFENDER
+
+  by Nicholas Kalashnikoff
+
+  illustrated by
+  Claire and George Louden, jr.
+
+  New York        1951
+  CHARLES SCRIBNER’S SONS
+
+
+
+
+  COPYRIGHT, 1951, BY
+  NICHOLAS KALASHNIKOFF
+
+  PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
+
+  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. NO PART OF THIS BOOK
+  MAY BE REPRODUCED IN ANY FORM WITHOUT
+  THE PERMISSION OF CHARLES SCRIBNER’S SONS
+
+  [Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+  TO
+  MY DAUGHTER
+
+
+
+
+AUTHOR’S FOREWORD
+
+
+_“Everywhere there is life, and everywhere there are warm human
+hearts.” These words, spoken by a school-teacher, I remember from many
+years ago when I was a boy in Siberia. The teacher, Ivan Pavin, was a
+man who took joy in his work and passed joy on to his pupils. The world
+was a more wonderful place for discovering it with him. Best of all, he
+delighted to tell us about people--all kinds of people--but especially
+those of northern Siberia who lived in never-ending conflict with a
+harsh land._
+
+_When I grew up and left the village, I spent several years in the Far
+North, where I had many occasions to test the truth of this saying.
+Yes--I found warm hearts in plenty, but none warmer than that of Tim,
+who was of the Yakut tribe. Tim’s full name was Timofey. He was greatly
+respected by people among whom he lived, not only because he was honest
+and brave but because he had powerful fists to match his courage. When
+words failed to convince, his fists often could. One thing about him
+interested me in particular. He was a self-appointed champion of the_
+chubuku, _or wild mountain rams, and took every opportunity to plead
+with hunters to spare these rare animals who were fast disappearing
+from the region._
+
+_“Why?” I asked him one day, upon hearing him threaten to punish a
+hunter who dared kill a ram in that neighborhood. “Why do you put
+yourself out to befriend these creatures? Are they so precious to you?”_
+
+_“Why?” he repeated my question. “That is simple. My step-father,
+Turgen, who was a Lamut, loved the mountain rams, and I made him a
+promise to protect them after he was gone. He is dead now--a fine man,
+as anyone will tell you. Perhaps you would like to hear about him.”_
+
+_I assured him that I would...._
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 1
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+This is the story of the Lamut, Turgen, who lived alone high in the
+hills of northeastern Siberia and had for friends a herd of mountain
+rams.
+
+Turgen, whose name means “fleet-of-foot” in the Lamut tongue, was a
+lonely man. It had not always been so. When he was younger he had had
+a wife and a son whom he loved. But both had died of an illness that
+burned like fire, and rested now in a single grave under the larch tree
+outside his door. He had also had the liking and trust of the Yakuts
+who were his neighbors in the valley below. Among them he was famed for
+his knowledge of medicine. Knowing him for a kindly, generous man, they
+came to him for healing grasses, and were never refused. He, in turn,
+visited them and sat by their _komeleks_, or fire-places, to exchange
+the latest news.
+
+All this was in the past. Turgen no longer received callers or went
+into the valley, except to take fish to the widow Marfa and receive
+milk for his own use. Marfa and her two children, a son Tim and a
+daughter Aksa, were Turgen’s only friends. For the most part he stayed
+close to his _yurta_, a simple hut perched between two cliffs above a
+mountain stream. On sunny days, when he was not hunting or fishing, he
+loved to sit on a rough bench under a great larch tree and smoke his
+pipe while watching the activity in the valley below. The mountains
+were full of mystery and peace. Because of them he could think of the
+past without regret.
+
+You wonder why the people of the valley shunned Turgen. The reason, you
+will say, was no reason at all. Word had spread among them that he was
+friendly with the wild rams who lived in the mountains. “Who ever heard
+of friendship between a man and mountain rams?” the Yakuts asked. It
+was impossible. And if it was impossible, then Turgen was a sorcerer--a
+partner of the devil.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 2
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+Gossip, starting like a small fire, got bigger and bigger. One occasion
+especially helped this evil rumor. On a holiday, years before, the
+people of the valley had gathered to eat and drink and dance. As
+always, the shamanist was present--a man believed to have power to
+communicate with the good and evil spirits who were part of an ancient
+faith. And as always he ate and drank with the gayest of the company.
+
+The shamanist had long been jealous of Turgen because of his influence
+over the Yakuts. For one thing, Turgen was a sober man and kept his
+wits at all times, which the shamanist did not do. As the shamanist was
+dependent upon voluntary contributions for his living, he could not
+tolerate the thought of yielding any authority to another.
+
+On this day the party went on hour after hour, until the shamanist from
+an excess of food, drink, and excitement fell down unconscious. To the
+superstitious Yakuts, who revered him greatly, he was in a trance and
+they waited eagerly to hear what he would report about his conversation
+with the spirits when he awoke.
+
+A woman named Stepa went to him and wailed:
+
+“Arise, O Shamanist, and open our eyes, ignorant people that we are.
+Tell us our future and what we have to fear.”
+
+In a short while the shamanist rose, looked about him with wild eyes,
+seized his tambourine and struck it several times.
+
+“I saw,” he muttered, “I saw a dark cloud swim across the sky to
+Turgen’s yurta. I looked. I looked, and in it was the figure of a
+devil. A real devil, with horns and a tail like a cow’s. I spoke,
+putting a spell upon him, and he changed into a wild ram. I made the
+spell stronger, and he vanished in the exact spot where Turgen lives. O
+my friends! Beware of the devil in the ram’s hide!”
+
+With that, the shamanist fell to the ground again exhausted.
+
+Amazed, the Yakuts said to one another, “He has seen the devil! Let us
+be thankful that the devil passed us by and went instead after the soul
+of Turgen.”
+
+[Illustration]
+
+But here the woman Stepa, who wanted to be in the shamanist’s good
+graces, interrupted. “Beware the devil!” she screamed. “He can come
+to you too. You say that Turgen is a Christian--but has anyone seen him
+pray when the priest visited us? No. Believe me, the devil is looking
+to have such people for a friend. Beware of Turgen! Avoid him!”
+
+The Yakuts were more impressed by the shamanist’s vision than by
+Stepa’s words. Still they listened and remembered. When, not long
+afterwards, the shamanist had another vision in which Turgen was
+associating with the devil, the simple started to believe. They did not
+condemn Turgen, nor would they harm him. “If he has bound himself to
+the devil,” they said, “that is his affair. We’ll just stay away from
+him.”
+
+They did so, and time passed. People might even have forgotten the
+story of Turgen’s sorcery had not a simple, foolish man named Nikita
+come running to the village one day to report in great excitement that
+he had seen Turgen sitting on the bench beneath his larch tree while a
+mountain ram strolled nearby.
+
+“With my own eyes I saw it,” he declared. “A wild ram in company with a
+man.”
+
+Everyone knew Nikita for a careless talker who embroidered truth with
+a lively imagination, but the Yakuts were a superstitious people and
+like many others were easily convinced by loud shouting. “Think of it,”
+they said, shaking their heads dolefully, “a wild ram has become tame.
+Such a thing has never been heard of before. This really smells of the
+devil’s work.”
+
+For these men had hunted the mountain rams all their lives and they
+knew that no wild creature in the world was so fearful of human beings.
+Hunting them was hazardous sport because the rams lived in the most
+remote crags. Many a hunter had fallen and been crippled for life
+trying to search them out. There was a saying that anyone who killed a
+ram was certain to meet misfortune, but this was one of those popular
+beliefs not to be examined too carefully for truth.
+
+Of course, the Yakuts might have gone to Turgen and questioned him, but
+they didn’t. “Is it reasonable to ask a sorcerer why he takes the devil
+for friend?” they asked. “Better stay out of harm’s way lest the evil
+spirits reach out and take the inquisitive ones also into their net.”
+
+So it was that the people of the valley no longer visited Turgen, or he
+them.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 3
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+“Words that speak evil, though they have no teeth, can tear the heart,”
+was an old proverb. It hurt Turgen that the Yakuts turned from him,
+avoided his questions and all contact with him. It was as if a dead
+wall of ill-will had suddenly risen between him and the people of the
+valley. Because he was ignorant of any wrong on his part, he tried not
+to think too much and went about his own affairs. But solitude is not
+easy to endure, for the reason that thoughts cannot be trapped. They
+keep buzzing round and round in the head, like angry autumn flies,
+giving one no rest.
+
+Turgen thought of himself as independent, healthy and strong and in
+need of no one’s assistance. Still it was difficult to be deprived of
+human talk and human association.
+
+Fortunately for him, there lived in the valley a widow named Marfa with
+her two children--a boy Tim and a girl Aksa--at whose komelek he was
+welcome to sit whenever it pleased him. There he would smoke his pipe
+and entertain the children with some story, and on leaving hear the
+warm and comforting words: “Come again Turgen, and soon.”
+
+Marfa owned a good cow which furnished milk sufficient for her own
+needs and for her friend. Turgen loved hot tea with milk, to him a real
+treat.
+
+Marfa’s yurta stood near a lake which was surrounded by a forest, far
+from other dwellings. The Yakuts seldom visited her. Knowing that she
+was poor, they feared she might ask something of them, and because of
+the children they might be moved to rash promises. Conscience has a way
+of making itself felt, like a thorn in the body, so they reasoned that
+it would be safer to stay away and avoid temptation.
+
+Marfa would have considered herself poor indeed had she not had a solid
+yurta and her fine cow. But one cannot live on milk alone. Necessity
+forced her to leave the children by day and work for some wealthy
+Yakuts. Her heart was never at ease with the children alone at home,
+but she had no choice.
+
+Hers was not an easy life. In the summer she caught fish by nets from
+the lake, mowed the field grass to feed the cow in winter, made clothes
+for the children, and saw to it that there was firewood stored away
+for the cold weather. Trees were abundant, but it was beyond her
+strength to chop them down, and she had no horse with which to drag the
+logs out of the woods. So, in return for housework, her Yakut employer
+chopped and delivered wood for her. In spite of work and worry, she did
+not complain. She asked nothing of God, except good health for herself,
+her children, and her cow. God must have seen and been pleased, for all
+of them were blessed with the best of health.
+
+The cow lived in a warm shed separated from the yurta by a thin
+partition which in summer opened like a window to admit her head. There
+she would stand chewing her cud and regarding everybody with her kind
+eyes. No wonder that she was considered a welcome member of the family.
+The children carried on long conversations with her, not in the least
+frightened by her great size and magnificent horns. They knew her to
+be good-natured and fully believed that she understood everything they
+said. Maybe she did. It is certain that she knew her name, Whitey, for
+she answered to it promptly when called. In the grazing season the
+children were charged to look after her lest she stray too far, but
+Marfa sometimes wondered whether it was not Whitey who guarded the
+children. In many ways her cow sense prompted her that her help was
+necessary if Tim and Aksa were to grow up well and strong, and she gave
+it gladly.
+
+These were Turgen’s friends in the valley, a kindly family but poor.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 4
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+A person who is alone spends a great deal of time in thought. It was
+so with Turgen. And though his thoughts repeated themselves day after
+day, still he found pleasure in them. True, they got mixed up at times,
+so that he found it difficult to separate present from past: all
+appeared part of one precious experience, without beginning or end. But
+whichever way his thoughts turned--there were Marfa and the children.
+
+They had become his friends shortly after the death of Marfa’s husband.
+Turgen had known the couple for years, but acquaintance is not the same
+as friendship.
+
+He remembered Marfa when she was a frightened girl working in the homes
+of wealthy Yakuts. At that time he had no occasion to speak to her, and
+besides she was very shy. Then when she was past her first youth she
+married a Yakut in the neighborhood who needed a good worker to look
+after his three cows. Marfa’s life was changed by marriage but it was
+not improved. Her husband was a sickly man unable to do a full day’s
+work, and when the children came her cares increased. The death of the
+husband soon after the birth of their second child left Marfa with the
+burden of the household upon her. Of the three cows, two had to be
+sold. Hardships and the years put wrinkles in her face and she grew old
+before her time. However, her body was fortunately still strong and she
+accepted what God sent.
+
+This part of her life Turgen knew only from hearsay. It was later that
+he met her as a friend, and he loved to recall the incident.
+
+One winter, returning from a hunt on skis, he was passing her yurta
+when he noticed that neither sparks nor smoke came from the chimney.
+He stopped at once, thinking in fright, “A dead chimney. What has
+happened? I must investigate.”
+
+To people of the North a chimney without life in the cold of winter is
+a sign of disaster.
+
+Turgen ran towards the yurta. While still some distance away he could
+hear the anxious mooing of the cow and a child weeping. He opened the
+door cautiously. The yurta was dark and cold.
+
+“Who is it? Come in and help me light a fire,” a childish voice
+called. Turgen struck a match and saw a small boy, his face and hands
+black with soot, rocking a cradle in which a baby sat crying as if the
+world were lost. With his free hand he tried to stir the fire in the
+komelek into life while he blew on its dead embers.
+
+“Let me,” Turgen said, and added, “Don’t be afraid of me. But I can see
+that you are a big boy and not easily frightened.”
+
+“Yes,” the boy answered soberly. “Mama says that I am already five and
+Aksa is two winters old. She is little and an awful cry-baby. My name
+is Tim. What is yours?”
+
+“My name is Turgen. I like you, Tim.”
+
+“I like you, too.”
+
+Then, examining Turgen by the light of the new dancing fire, he said,
+“Why should I be afraid of you? You built the fire, so you must be
+kind.”
+
+“Where is your mother?” Turgen asked.
+
+“She went to work and I was to keep up the fire. But I slept and the
+fire died,” the boy admitted guiltily.
+
+The yurta was now warm and cheerful. Both the cow and the baby had
+stopped their crying. The little girl could not take her bright,
+inquisitive eyes away from the strange man.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+While taking off his kuklianka Turgen questioned the boy. “Is the cow
+hungry that she was calling so? And what about your sister?”
+
+Tim shrugged his shoulders. “Our cow always moos like that when there
+is no fire in the komelek. She is afraid for us. And Aksa must be
+hungry. Mama told me to give her milk with hot water to drink, but how
+could I heat the water when there was no fire?”
+
+“Of course,” Turgen agreed. “That wasn’t your fault. I’ll do it right
+away.”
+
+Having had her warm milk, Aksa was soon sitting on Turgen’s knees
+looking with drowsy and contented eyes into the leaping fire. The
+visitor pleased her as well as Tim.
+
+Happy to have their trust, Turgen considered what other help he could
+give them. “Have you any flour, meat and fish?” he asked the boy.
+
+Tim shook his head, “Mama said that there is a little barley meal, but
+no meat or fish. She will ask the neighbors for some. Perhaps you are
+hungry. I will give you half of my mill-cake. Do you want it?”
+
+“No, thank you, Tim. I am not hungry. Besides, there is smoked uikola
+in my bag. Do you like it?”
+
+“Very much. It is fat. Aksa also loves it, and Mama too. Give some to
+them.”
+
+“I shall give you all that I have and later I’ll bring you more.”
+
+Turgen was enjoying his conversation with the bright little boy. “Tell
+me, who taught you how to keep the fire going in the komelek?”
+
+“Mama,” said Tim promptly. “She says that if you blow on the hot coals
+they will flare up. But no matter how hard I blew, nothing happened. We
+have matches but Mama hides them from me. She is afraid I might set the
+yurta on fire.”
+
+Aksa was ready to sleep now, so Turgen wrapped a blanket around her and
+put her in the basket, which served as a crib. Then he examined the
+yurta.
+
+Poverty stared at him from every corner. Nowhere could he see a sign of
+food. “I will come tomorrow and bring more fish,” he promised himself,
+“for I have plenty of everything.”
+
+“When do you expect your mother?” he asked Tim.
+
+“Soon. She never lets us stay alone in the dark, and it is almost
+evening. Maybe she got a lot of fish and it is heavy for her to carry,”
+he suggested.
+
+“Perhaps. But sit up until she comes, and keep the fire going. In
+weather like this it is easy to freeze without a fire.” He picked up
+his kuklianka. “Now I must be going. Tell your mother that the Lamut
+Turgen was here. She knows me.”
+
+The boy looked at Turgen with eyes which begged him to stay. “I like to
+watch the fire ... when I am not alone. You know how to do everything,
+don’t you? When I grow up I will know everything too, just like you.
+Please don’t go for a while.”
+
+“I must,” Turgen told him. “I live in the mountains and want to be home
+before it gets too dark. It is good that you are not the cowardly sort.”
+
+“Why must you get home before dark?” Tim wanted to know. “Are you
+afraid of wolves? I hear they attack people in winter. But you have a
+gun. What kind is it? A good one?”
+
+Turgen threw back his head and laughed. “Oh, what a talker! You know
+about wolves and even guns. Someday you’ll surely be a hunter. And now,
+good-by. Mind you don’t fall asleep. I’ll be back soon.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 5
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+Night comes quickly in the north, so Turgen walked briskly. His heart
+was troubled as he thought of the children. Only extreme want could
+have forced Marfa to leave them alone. For the closest neighbor, he
+knew, lived not less than half a mile away.
+
+“Poor woman! Here I have everything and she nothing. It is necessary to
+help her. But how?”
+
+Arriving home, he was moved by a sudden impulse to fill a sack full of
+frozen fish and partridges. Then, grabbing up some salt and tea, he
+started back to Marfa’s. So high were his spirits, he did not feel the
+weight of his load. As his skis carried him swiftly down hill, he could
+see from a distance bright sparks flying from the yurta’s chimney.
+
+“The boy is not sparing with the wood. That is good.” Then it occurred
+to him: “But maybe Marfa is home by now.” The thought abashed him, for
+he reasoned: “Suppose she refuses my gift and says ‘I am not a pauper
+that I should accept charity’?” And it was possible that she shared the
+distrust of the valley people toward him.
+
+At the door he stood for some time hesitating. Finally he decided: “Be
+what may. I will say that I have no money, but I wish to buy milk from
+her and will pay for it with these foodstuffs.” Nevertheless, he set
+the sack outside the door before he knocked timidly.
+
+Marfa’s voice said, “Who’s there? Come in.”
+
+As he stepped over the threshold the boy cried out in joy: “It is he,
+Mama. The kind man who built the fire and gave us the uikola. I told
+you he would return.”
+
+Marfa looked at Turgen, saw that he was embarrassed, and held out her
+hand in greeting. “Don’t mind Tim. Take off your kuklianka and come sit
+by the fire. Thank you for what you did for the children. I was working
+and was delayed. It always worries me to leave them alone, but what can
+I do?”
+
+Moving quickly, she placed a tea kettle on the fire, brought out a
+small table and said: “Move closer to the fire and the light. Have some
+hot tea with mill-cakes and the uikola you gave us. You are welcome to
+all there is. Tomorrow they have promised to pay me in fish. My last
+year’s catch was very poor and I have nothing left, although it is only
+January.”
+
+Marfa spoke simply, but her voice was charged with anxiety.
+
+Squatting before the fire, Turgen took out his pipe and with his bare
+fingers picked up a burning ember with which to light it. He inhaled
+deeply, then let his breath go. From behind the screen of smoke he
+looked at Marfa attentively.
+
+Now it came to him for the first time that he really did not know her
+at all. She was a thin woman of medium height, quick and determined in
+her movements. Her face had the prominent cheek bones and flattened
+nose of the Yakut. While she was not pretty, she was pleasing to look
+at with her dark, thick hair and hazel eyes full of kindness. “There
+is beauty of soul in her eyes,” thought Turgen, “but sorrow too.”
+He imagined he could read in them the truth she tried to hide: “If
+tomorrow I don’t get anything, I really don’t know what will become of
+us. You can see for yourself how poorly we live.”
+
+At a loss how to console her, and embarrassed by his own distress,
+Turgen turned to Tim as a safe subject of conversation. “You know, you
+have a fine son, Marfa. He was generous enough to offer me half of his
+mill-cake. He should be a great help to you.”
+
+“Well,” Marfa answered hesitantly, “but it will take time. However,
+the young do grow up fast. If only God will give me the strength to
+raise them and put them on their feet.” Then she added more cheerfully,
+“Do sit down. We’ll have some tea. Everything is ready.”
+
+Feeling bolder and more at ease now, Turgen said, “Thank you, I will.
+Only permit me to give you a present. It is right here outside the
+door.”
+
+Without waiting for her reply, he got the sack of provisions and
+brought it into the yurta.
+
+“Mama, Mama,” Tim cried, “now you don’t have to go to work. Look at all
+the food he brought us!”
+
+Marfa leaned against the wall and her eyes filled with tears. Turgen
+was more embarrassed than ever. But before he could think what to say
+or what to do, Marfa recovered her composure and thanked him warmly.
+“My husband used to tell me that the Yakuts avoided you because you
+lived in the mountains and ... were friendly with wild rams. He also
+said that you were kind and that the people stupidly spread false tales
+about you. Now I can see this for myself. Sit down. Do. Talk to Tim
+while I go to prepare a real dinner.”
+
+That was an unforgettable evening for Turgen. Though few words were
+exchanged, he felt that much had been communicated because the hours
+held so much of friendship and hospitality. Tim was long asleep by the
+time he was ready to leave.
+
+It had not been difficult to persuade Marfa to supply him with milk in
+return for provisions. “To tell you the truth,” he said, “I have so
+much food that it will take care of all of us. And I need your milk. I
+used to get milk from the valley people, but now as you know they do
+not approve of me. I am sorry about this, and I should be more than
+sorry if they caused you any trouble because of your kindness to me.”
+
+Marfa’s voice was firm as she answered him: “You are my friend, Turgen.
+You are saving my children and me from want and perhaps starvation. Who
+can forbid me to choose my own friends? Do not fear. I will look out
+for myself. Before I was timid, but now I am a mother and in my home I
+am mistress.”
+
+So Turgen’s friendship with Marfa and her family began. In the next
+fours years, until Tim was nine and Aksa six, it grew and flourished.
+“Surely God Himself directed my footsteps to their yurta,” Turgen would
+often think.
+
+All would have been well, except that the evil let loose in the valley
+was spreading and the feeling of the people against him grew and grew.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 6
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+From Marfa, Turgen learned what his neighbors thought of him and
+said of him. Although he cared, he was a proud man and did not think
+it necessary to justify his actions to anyone. Furthermore, he was
+discovering that solitude can be a very pleasant thing. Now that
+visitors no longer came with their trifling requests, he had time to
+enjoy his small kingdom. Here he had lived all his life and he loved
+it--the mountains with their strange enchantment, the brook, the lake,
+the forest, the simple yurta. And always there was with him the memory
+of the wife and son his love and knowledge had not been able to save
+though he tried every art at his command. The flowers he had planted on
+their grave bloomed each summer and beckoned him on warm days to sit
+there on his bench with his pipe for company.
+
+Turgen was one of those lean, muscular men to whom the years are kind.
+His coppery skin, so free of hair, was finely wrinkled under the
+narrow, kindly eyes, deepset beneath bushy brows. His gray hair grew in
+untidy rows like a neglected field. But his hands kept their firmness,
+his eyes their sharpness, his feet the spring of youth. How old was
+he? Impossible to say, for he had stopped reckoning the years when he
+reached fifty. “Why count the winters?” he asked himself. “You live
+through them, and thank God. For whom is it necessary to know?”
+
+In short, Turgen looked like what he was--a kindly man, built to endure
+the life of a hunter and fisherman. In both these pursuits he was very
+skillful. And he was not poor, though many considered him so because
+he owned neither horses nor cows. No one is really poor who can have
+food for the taking, and Turgen had besides valuable pelts which were
+ready exchange for cartridges, yarn for nets, barley meal, salt, and
+other provisions supplied by a merchant who called once a month. Kamov
+was the merchant’s name. His visits gave Turgen much pleasure, for he
+brought news of the world and was always ready for a friendly chat.
+
+What he got from the merchant Turgen shared with Marfa and her
+children. It was a holiday for him just to sit in her yurta sipping
+tea and saying nothing. To Marfa he had little to talk about, but with
+the children he talked freely of many things--mostly of the life
+around them, and of his boyhood. When the children, full of curiosity,
+wanted to know more and more, and questioned him about other marvels
+he knew, he told them tales to make their eyes grow big--tales of the
+great warrior Tugan and his son Chaal, a famous athlete; stories of
+the animals and fish who inhabited the tundra; legends explaining the
+sun and moon and stars. The sun, it seemed, was servant to the Great
+Spirit, a powerful warrior clothed in armor of precious stones and
+wearing a crown of fire. The moon was his sister and one of her duties
+was to guard the stars, those eyes of countless angels, to make sure
+they did not go out and plunge the world into darkness.
+
+Yes, Turgen knew everything.
+
+These evenings were rare. In winter he did not call for his milk
+oftener than twice a month but spent the long evenings weaving his nets
+or smoking his pipe while he stared into the fire and reflected on the
+odd turns that life takes, on the joys that he knew in the peace of his
+mountains. Or if the solitude became a burden, he would take down from
+a shelf a reed he had carved long ago from a willow tree. And placing
+it to his lips he would bring forth a sweet, sad melody that would
+express thoughts impossible to put in words.
+
+After that he would lie down to sleep like a marmot, covered snugly
+under two blankets made of the skins of rabbits and wolves. If he was
+fortunate, he would be carried off in dreams to another and happier
+life. What he liked best was to dream of his wife and son, to re-live
+the fine times they had together. But to his regret nice dreams were
+few, the winters long and stern.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 7
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+The mountain rams had become a part of Turgen’s life almost by
+accident. It all began so long ago that he never gave thought to it
+until one day Marfa out of curiosity asked him a question which brought
+to mind an almost forgotten incident.
+
+“Why do you call them rams?” she wanted to know. “Are not they the same
+as sheep?”
+
+“Yes and no,” Turgen answered. “In the family of domestic sheep only
+the males have horns. But all wild rams have horns. Of course, those of
+the female rams are smaller.”
+
+Marfa nodded. “But is it not strange that only recently you came to
+love the rams? Surely you knew them before.”
+
+“Of course I knew them. When I was young I used to hunt them.”
+
+“You killed them?” Aksa asked in a shocked voice.
+
+“I did,” Turgen admitted. “It was a sin. Unfortunately, one has to live
+many years to understand what is good and what evil. Living alone is a
+help to thinking, and often something will happen to open a man’s eyes.”
+
+He paused, got up and put wood on the fire, sat down again and puffed
+on his pipe.
+
+“Let me tell you what happened to me twenty or more years ago. It was
+winter. November. Government officials called to order me to act as
+guide to an important foreigner, a hunter. The man was impressive--tall
+and stern and clean-shaven. I couldn’t understand a word he said
+but an interpreter explained that he had come to hunt our mountain
+rams. I wasn’t very anxious to go with him, but what could I do? The
+authorities insisted.
+
+“Well, I led them up the mountain. A hunt--pah! It was a picnic. There
+were about twenty people in the party, including Russian and Yakut
+officials. There was so much to eat and drink that soon all were acting
+as if they were insane--shooting at everything and anything until the
+hills echoed with their noise. One thing I must admit though. They had
+excellent guns.”
+
+Tim ventured an observation. “With such guns they undoubtedly killed
+many animals.”
+
+Turgen’s smile was contemptuous. “No. How could they? They couldn’t
+even aim straight. In two weeks they killed two wolves, ten rabbits,
+and one bear they roused out of his lair. As for rams, I confess that I
+was crafty and led them places where rams were usually not to be found.
+Yet a family of five did appear suddenly out of nowhere. O, Lord, what
+firing there was! They all fired at once, seized by greed. And somehow
+they managed to kill the largest one, who was probably old and the last
+in line. At least, that’s the only way I can explain their luck. The
+poor fellow fell, and while the other rams vanished so quickly that not
+even the dogs could catch up with them, the hunters threw themselves
+upon him. What a disgusting spectacle it was. And for what? So that
+the important visitor could have a pelt and some horns. The horns were
+truly fine. ‘He will brag about them for the rest of his life,’ the
+interpreter said.
+
+“It was this brutal murder,” Turgen went on, “that awoke in me pity for
+the rams. I was more sly after that and led the party only to places
+when rams would never go. When the officials grew angry, complaining
+that I was a poor guide and that because of me they were disgraced
+before the foreigner, I answered: ‘What can I do? Your shooting has
+frightened the animals away and they have run for perhaps a hundred
+miles.’ They complained and threatened some more. Then they held a
+council to decide where they could find another guide. But the Yakuts
+told them that Turgen was the best in the whole region. The affair
+might have ended differently, but it got cold suddenly, there was
+a blizzard, and the important visitor left post haste for his own
+country. Of course, I rejoiced that the rams were now left in peace.
+But for several winters I did not see them. They had gone from here.
+In time, as you know, they returned. I saw them rarely. They came and
+vanished. Still I was happy to have them living again in my mountains.”
+As they listened intently, Marfa and the children shared Turgen’s fears
+and happiness. Now they understood his affection for the rams.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 8
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+By stepping on to a ledge outside his door, Turgen on a clear day had
+a wonderful view of the valley below and the mountains above him. When
+he tired of watching the tiny figures of men and women scurrying about
+at the foot of his hill, he had only to turn his eyes upward to see a
+different and fascinating sight. For there, dodging among the crags,
+were specks which he knew to be wild rams.
+
+“How do they live?” he asked himself one evening. The hills were barren
+except for sparse tufts of moss, an occasional thin clump of grass,
+and now and then a tough, hardy shrub that could not contain much
+nourishment.
+
+His curiosity and pity aroused, Turgen watched the rams intently all
+that season and the next. He could make out nine individuals of what
+he assumed to be a family--or, as he called it, a tribe. In summer
+one lamb--or it might be two--were added to the number, but they
+disappeared with cold weather.
+
+Then Turgen began to worry. For with the cold weather came snow to
+cover the moss and grass and dry up the meagre shrubs. Even at a
+distance he could sense the animals’ despair as they searched avidly
+beneath the snow for any poor morsel to chew upon. Their grey-brown
+wool hung loosely on them now, and they moved indifferently, without
+spirit. Unless there was a hint of danger. Then they would lift their
+heads proudly and take themselves into the distance with incredible
+lightness and speed.
+
+“Poor things.” Turgen spoke his thoughts aloud. “To think that I used
+to hunt you to kill you! What harm are you to anyone? You who ask only
+for freedom.”
+
+But pity could not help them. He must find a way to give them practical
+aid. He considered one thing, then another. At last he fixed upon a
+plan.
+
+First he built a light sleigh which he loaded with hay. Then, putting
+on skis, he pulled the sleigh to the ridge of the next mountain, dumped
+the hay, and returned home. Not a ram was in sight, but he could feel
+their inquisitive and fearful eyes upon him from behind the boulders
+farther up the hill.
+
+From his own door he watched them approach the hay warily, circle it
+and trample it, and stoop to nibble at it. They seemed to fear a trap.
+But when he went back to the spot the hay was gone. After that he took
+frequent offerings of food to them, and gradually the rams came to
+accept his gifts without hesitation. Although they never approached
+him when he visited the feeding ground, he caught glimpses of them in
+hiding, awaiting his coming. In order to gain their greater confidence,
+he made it a point never to carry a gun. He even gave up his habit of
+carrying an iron-tipped stick which helped him in climbing. For he knew
+that all animals fear the rod which gives forth noise and fire.
+
+It was not easy to conquer the fear of these wild creatures. It needed
+patience as well as understanding. But Turgen had both. Season after
+season he gave them care and attention, and was rewarded by knowing
+that they accepted him and depended upon him even though they did not
+fully trust him. A time came when they no longer hid from him but
+stood watching from a safe distance as if to determine what sort of
+being this was from whom they received nothing but good. And he had
+another satisfaction. The food he gave them worked a miracle in their
+appearance. They were no longer the sad, dishevelled animals of former
+days.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+His heart leaped for joy one day when he went to the feeding ground
+and discovered the entire ram family gathered in a group on a little
+mound near by.
+
+“Eh!” Turgen declared with pleasure. “You are truly a good-looking
+band--strong and healthy. And you eat now as if you enjoyed it.”
+
+The rams eyed him gravely, with an expression that might have been
+gratitude on their long homely faces.
+
+“Yes,” they seemed to be saying. “Perhaps your pampered cattle down
+below would not thrive on this fare, but for savages like us it is
+nourishing. You see, we are not looking to put on fat, merely to
+survive.”
+
+With these friends, who had become like his own children, Turgen knew
+that he would never again be lonely as before.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 9
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+“A good man greets each new day as if it were a holiday.” Turgen
+thought of this proverb upon waking every morning now, because it
+described exactly the way he felt. By becoming the protector of these
+defenseless animals, he had found a mission which used all the warmth
+of his lonely heart. He only regretted that the idea of feeding the
+rams had occurred to him so late. “But why waste time in regret?” he
+reflected. “Better rejoice that the idea came to me at last.”
+
+In order not to give the rams occasion for fright, it was necessary
+to change certain of his habits. For one thing, he did no hunting at
+all in the neighborhood of his yurta and the rams’ feeding ground, but
+travelled some distance before permitting himself to fire a shot. He
+was gratified to discover before long that with the coming of spring
+birds and small animals, especially squirrels, flocked to his mountain
+side in great numbers. It was as if a rumor had spread that his place
+was their assurance of safety. The next spring and the next it was
+the same. Gay and charming visitors he had never known before came to
+delight him with their presence, and he felt himself being drawn into
+another world. How wonderful to be looked upon as a friend rather than
+as an enemy of these creatures!
+
+In three years the rams, too, showed growing confidence in him. He fed
+them regularly, even when the snow melted and the crevices of the rocky
+hills revealed young grass and tender new shoots on the shrubs.
+
+One sunny day he had gone as usual to the Rams’ Mountain and was
+standing on a ledge near the feeding ground waiting for them to appear.
+Soon he saw three coming cautiously toward him. Quickly he stepped out
+of sight. By their watchful movements he judged that they had been sent
+to reconnoitre, and he was more sure of this a moment later when they
+bleated a piercing “Ma-a! Ma-a!”
+
+He could not doubt that this was a signal to inform hidden companions
+that all was well, for the entire ram family now appeared, led by a
+huge powerful fellow who held his head with its sharp spiralling horns
+proudly. “What strength! What assurance!” Turgen thought, enchanted.
+The long beard and tail indicated that the leader ram was not young,
+but his legs were slender and built to endure. He had a reddish-brown
+coat flecked here and there with white. By his extraordinary size and
+confident attitude he impressed his authority on the herd.
+
+When the leader after a brief survey had satisfied himself that
+there was no danger he spoke calmly to his charges. “Ma-a!” he said.
+Whereupon all the rams fell to eating.
+
+Turgen counted them: six females and three males--with two lambs not
+more than three weeks old, which he had not seen before. Unlike the
+lambs he had noticed briefly in previous seasons, these were gay and
+frisky and seemed prepared to enjoy a long life. Two lambs to six
+females was not a large increase. Still they were promise of new
+generations. Turgen was overjoyed. Surely the smaller one must be a
+girl, the larger one a boy. He watched them drink greedily of their
+mother’s milk, then pick at some grass only to reject it disdainfully
+and return to their mothers. Clearly they preferred milk to the food of
+grown-ups.
+
+Turgen could not take his eyes from the rams, his wild mountaineers. In
+his imagination he saw this little family grown into a great herd.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 10
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+Just then the leader sounded a sharp warning upon which the rams
+vanished. Turgen looked to see what had frightened them, but could
+discover nothing amiss. He listened, and heard a noise as of sifting
+sand and gravel. Someone must be there. But who? Then his attentive
+eyes caught sight of a bear stealthily creeping toward the clearing. He
+was enormous.
+
+By nature a bear was clumsy and sluggish, no match in speed for the
+light-footed rams, but he had his own sure method of hunting. He would
+search out the path by which the rams traveled to get food and water,
+and there he would lie in wait for them behind one of the cliffs. He
+would wait for hours, patiently. Providing the wind was in his favor,
+his scent did not betray him and the rams would come unsuspectingly
+within reach. Then a pounce, a single blow of his enormous paw, and the
+nearest ram would be killed.
+
+Turgen knew all this, knew also that the bear before him was an
+experienced hunter. Lacking a gun, he was powerless to give the rams
+any help. He thought of shouting, remembering that a bear is afraid of
+the human voice, but this might frighten the rams even more and decide
+them to seek another place of refuge. What then was he to do?
+
+Rocks! He would throw rocks at the bear.
+
+Taking quick aim, he fired a stone which lit near the bear’s feet. The
+animal stopped, turned his head to sniff the air from all directions.
+When his eyes fixed upon Turgen above him, he let out a roar of fright
+that echoed from cliff to cliff and threw himself down the hillside.
+The clatter was terrific as he rolled over brush and outthrustings of
+rocks, crashing and bouncing and setting in motion a series of small
+landslides.
+
+Attracted by the racket the old ram reappeared farther up the mountain
+and stood watching his enemy’s progress with an expression of
+contentment.
+
+Satisfied that the rams were safe, Turgen started home conscious that
+the leader was following him with his eyes. A dreadful thought assailed
+him: What if the rams associated him with the bear? What if their old
+suspicion of man were aroused and they left this region for another?
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 11
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+That night Turgen could sleep little, but tossed and turned in anxiety
+lest his charges desert him. For they had become necessary to him,
+perhaps more necessary than he to them. The next morning he rose early
+and hurried to the feeding ground with a generous supply of grass. Good
+or bad, he must know the truth.
+
+His fears were promptly quieted when he saw the rams’ fresh tracks in
+the clearing. As usual, he deposited the hay, then stood behind a rock
+to wait. But not for long. First to come were the scouts, then the
+leader. Then the family. In spite of their dirty-brown coats they were
+to him a lovely sight in their strength and grace and daring. The old
+leader was like a king arrayed in tatters, fully three feet in height
+and nearly six feet from tip to tip. The females, appropriately, were
+smaller, with almost straight horns, and held themselves with a kind of
+humility.
+
+But it was the lambs to whom Turgen’s heart went out. “The darlings!”
+he whispered.
+
+Of course, the shy one who never ventured from her mother’s side was a
+female, the gay prankish one a male. If in his play he dared approach
+the cliff, the old leader recalled him with a snort to his anxious
+parent.
+
+“Eh! They are splendid children.”
+
+The rams seemed at home and at ease wandering about the clearing, and
+Turgen was reminded that it took more than a single fright to make
+them forsake their accustomed haunts. They were known to be stubbornly
+faithful to the place which provided them with food and shelter.
+
+Turgen was starting down the mountain to return home when he noticed
+the leader ram circle the clearing excitedly, then with amazing
+lightness spring to the top of a rocky ledge where he had a good view
+of the mountain side. Sharply he surveyed the region, and sharply gave
+warning.
+
+The warning was taken up by the other males, and promptly the females
+ranged themselves in a circle with their rumps together and their heads
+pointing out. The lambs, held within the circle, pushed against their
+elders inquisitively in an effort to get out, where were the other
+males.
+
+As a general, the leader was magnificent. From a height of at least
+twenty-five feet he dropped easily to the clearing and again made a
+full swing around its center edge. On another signal from him the males
+took posts along the cliff and the herd froze in position, front legs
+braced, horns lowered, all facing the exposed slope.
+
+“An astonishing battle formation!” Turgen said to himself in excitement
+and wonder. The rams were prepared to fight off an enemy. But who was
+the enemy? “Wolves?” Turgen wondered. He had heard of rams’ exploits in
+battle, but never had he seen anything like this.
+
+Intently he watched, and soon he saw three forest wolves approaching
+the clearing, enormous beasts made bold and dangerous by hunger through
+the winter. His heart beat fast with terror for his herd. What he would
+have given for a gun! Lacking that, he made sure that his knife was
+ready to hand, even though he knew himself to be a helpless onlooker
+should the wolves attack. “For I’m not a bird and not a ram, to go from
+crag to crag,” he thought.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+The first wolf had reached the edge of the clearing now. With his mouth
+open, revealing powerful tusks, and the hair erect on his spine, he was
+terrifying to look at. Turgen heard him growl, a low fierce rumble, and
+waited for him to pounce, but instead he flung himself full length
+on the ground while still keeping his burning eyes on the rams. Was he
+perhaps selecting his prey? Turgen did not know, but he saw how the
+female rams drew together in a closer circle behind the leader. It was
+quite clear by their staunch attitudes that the rams had no intention
+of running away.
+
+What a battle it would be! But what chance had the rams against those
+three beasts?
+
+The first wolf, tiring of inactivity and prompted by greed, decided
+against waiting longer for his companions and rose to his feet. Slowly
+he advanced. With each cautious step Turgen expected him to plunge.
+
+Then an amazing thing happened. The old ram without warning, lowered
+his head to the ground and sprang at the advancing enemy. So exactly
+had he gauged the distance that his horns struck the wolf in the chest
+with an impact strong enough to raise him in the air and send him
+hurtling over the cliff. His howls echoed around the mountain as he
+fell and so distracted the other two wolves that they turned from the
+clearing and raced after their unlucky comrade.
+
+It seemed not more than a minute that it took to wage and win the
+battle. Then the herd of rams broke formation to lie down and rest.
+Except for the lambs who were as full of play as ever.
+
+Turgen, making his way home on legs which did not seem to belong to
+him, lived over again the old ram’s victory. It was as if the triumph
+were his own.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 12
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+At home he could not get the incident out of his mind. These wild
+mountaineers had become like his own flesh and blood--what happened to
+them was his experience also.
+
+It was midnight, but he could not sleep from excitement. Reaching for
+his reed, he started to play--and soon the yurta was filled with music
+that spoke of sadness and at the same time of quiet rejoicing. The
+melodies were new to him. They had seemingly sprung out of the air in
+order to celebrate the afternoon’s wonderful adventure.
+
+At last he lay down to rest. With all his heart he desired this night
+to see a fine dream. What kind of a dream he did not know, but he felt
+that he must communicate the day’s fortune to the good spirit of the
+yurta. For had not a good spirit come to drive out the evil spirit when
+he made himself the protector of the rams? Turgen believed that it
+had. For his faith in God--the Great Spirit who ruled the world--did
+not exclude the possibility that there were other spirits known to his
+forefathers who acted as messengers for God and Satan and had more time
+to concern themselves with the affairs of a poor Lamut.
+
+His wish was granted him. In his sleep he saw a joyous dream.
+
+His wife and son entered the yurta, looking just as he remembered them.
+He wanted to welcome them, to say a thousand things he had in his mind
+to tell them, but no words came. He could only gaze at their dear faces
+in silent astonishment.
+
+His wife came near, took him by the hand, smiled and said: “Turgen, get
+up and come with us. The Great Spirit is happy that you are taking care
+of the wild rams and wants to thank you personally.”
+
+Turgen rose as he was directed and went with them. But his wife and
+son seemed to float through the air rather than walk and he had great
+difficulty keeping up. Up hills, over vertical cliffs he followed after
+them, gasping from exhaustion and fearful that they would abandon him.
+
+Finally he called out in despair: “Help me. I cannot keep up with you.
+If you do not help me, I shall never see the Great Spirit.”
+
+Encouragingly his wife answered: “Yes, Turgen, you are tired. But don’t
+be afraid. We will help you.”
+
+With that she took him by one hand, the son by the other, and all three
+rose into the air. Higher and higher they flew, to dizzy heights where
+it was hard to breathe, and came at last to a mountain whose top was
+lost in the clouds. When they had landed in a small field Turgen looked
+around him amazed.
+
+“What an immense place!” he exclaimed. “If the Great Spirit lives this
+far away it is no wonder that we never see him.”
+
+The place was remarkable for more than its size. The mountains familiar
+to Turgen were also high, but bleak and bare. Here were fields with
+trees and flowers growing in abundance and giving off odors that
+tickled the nostrils. And in the midst of the wonders he saw lambs
+browsing under the guardianship of wolves.
+
+“What is this?” he asked his wife. “How can such young things be
+entrusted to killer-beasts?”
+
+Smilingly she said: “There are no killers here, Turgen. Here
+everyone--birds, animals, people--live in love and harmony.”
+
+“Wonderful!” Turgen exclaimed. “I should like to live here myself for a
+while.”
+
+“You will in due time,” the woman assured him. “But come now--the Great
+Spirit is expecting you.”
+
+Turgen looked around, expecting to see a large yurta in which the Great
+Spirit lived, but instead he saw only a great larch tree and under it
+a bench very like his own. An aged man dressed in white was sitting
+there, a man who bore striking resemblance to his long-dead grandfather.
+
+“Who is this?” Turgen asked himself. “Is it possible that he is the
+Great Spirit? I did not picture him so. This man is lean and not very
+tall and there is nothing of grandeur about him. No doubt he is a
+servant.”
+
+But meeting the old man’s eyes, which held a kind of fire, he was
+seized with fear and reverence. Humbly he fell on his knees and
+whispered: “Forgive me, Almighty! I, a sinner, failed to recognize you.
+How could I recognize you, since I have never seen you?”
+
+A gentle voice replied: “Rise, my son. Do not be afraid. If you have
+not seen me, yet you heard me when I said to you, ‘Turgen, go feed the
+starving rams. They are my children too, just as you are.’ Your heart
+is open to goodness. You have given me much joy. Now rise and sit here
+beside me.”
+
+Eagerly, Turgen leaped to his feet--and woke up.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 13
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+For a moment he was grievously disappointed at having lost his dream,
+but soon a great happiness overtook him. Surely this was no ordinary
+dream, he told himself. The Great Spirit in his mysterious wisdom had
+chosen this way to make his favor known. Although Turgen longed to
+rush down the hill and share the night’s adventure with Marfa and her
+children, he didn’t--because the dream, for a reason he was at a loss
+to explain, seemed to belong to him alone.
+
+Did Marfa notice that something of extraordinary importance had
+happened to him? If so, she gave no sign, for it was not her habit to
+question. Nevertheless, Turgen felt a sense of guilt that he should
+conceal anything from his kind friends.
+
+The children especially might well have asked: “Turgen, why don’t you
+tell us stories any more? Why don’t you play the reed and sit by the
+komelek and smoke?”
+
+For he did none of these things, being so preoccupied by his own
+thoughts and concerns. He went for his milk as usual, gave abrupt
+greetings, asked absurd questions which deserved no answers, and
+quickly departed.
+
+The truth was, he had to admit honestly, that the family of rams had
+become dearer to him than anything or anyone.
+
+At home there was more than enough work to keep him busy, for it was
+important that he make good use of what was left of the summer. Hay
+must be dried and stored for the rams, wood chopped to last a long
+winter, fish and game caught and packed away in a small cellar not far
+from the yurta--a hole dug in the ground where food stayed fresh summer
+and winter. He remembered the old proverb:
+
+“What the summer gives, the winter will swallow.”
+
+As a result of his dream he suddenly gave most careful attention to his
+housekeeping. Every day he swept the floor, and he polished the kettles
+and pots until they shone. He did this because, secretly, he cherished
+the hope that his wife and son would visit him again. Maybe--who
+knows?--the Great Spirit himself might condescend to drop in.
+
+But always the rams came first. At least twice a week, in every kind
+of weather, he carried food to them. He fed them even though the
+mountains were still green with vegetation, because they were now
+more than ever necessary to him. Besides, the succulent grass which
+he gathered in the valley gave variety to their diet and they loved
+it. While the rams never came close to him but maintained a respectful
+distance, they showed no nervousness at sight of him, and this pleased
+him very much.
+
+The summer, brief as a dream, had brought changes in the flock. The
+rams had taken on flesh, their coats were soft and thick and of a
+uniform brown except for tufts of white on the sides, under the groin
+and neck. The similar markings confirmed Turgen’s belief that they
+were of the same family. Warm weather and plenty of food had made them
+active, also; often, out of sheer high spirits, two grown up males
+would lock horns in combat. And every day, it seemed, the lambs were
+inspired to new feats of inventiveness and daring.
+
+The male lamb especially enchanted Turgen. Everything his elders did he
+tried to imitate, executing leaps that made Turgen’s heart turn over in
+fear. At times his impudent pranks brought him a sharp reprimand from
+the leader.
+
+“The scamp!” Turgen exclaimed. “That one was born to get himself
+noticed.”
+
+Soon, Turgen reminded himself, he must exercise still greater vigilance
+for with autumn hunters would be abroad in the hills. While he doubted
+that his superstitious neighbors from the valley would come near his
+yurta, stranger things had happened and he dared not count on it. To
+every hunter the rams were an irresistible attraction.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 14
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+September came, bringing its customary changeable weather. One damp and
+windy day when all the furies seemed loose, Turgen went as usual to
+take food to his charges and stand watch.
+
+“Though why anyone should come out in this weather I don’t know,” he
+thought. “Even the rams will surely keep under shelter.”
+
+But no. He had time only to drop the hay and retreat to his watching
+post when there they were in full strength--the whole family. The rain
+annoyed them and they shook themselves from time to time. Otherwise
+they showed no discomfiture. While the leader and two other males
+circled the clearing on the alert for danger, the rest stood quietly
+in the lee of the cliff waiting for the rain to abate. Looking for the
+lambs, Turgen saw them lying snugly under their mothers’ bellies.
+
+At the first sign of the weather’s clearing Turgen’s favorite jumped
+up and ran to urge the second lamb to romp with him. She refused,
+preferring her comfort. He then advanced on the older rams, trying by
+all the wiles he could command to get their attention. Turgen almost
+laughed aloud watching his antics.
+
+“What a show-off!” Then he worried. “It is cold and wet for one so
+young. He will get sick.-- But that’s an absurd idea. He is not made of
+clay that he will melt.”
+
+Soon after this the rain stopped and Turgen started for home. He
+had gone only a few steps when a shot rang out. There were hunters
+somewhere in the hills nearby--too far away to menace the herd of rams
+but the sound of gunfire alone was enough to cause panic. While the
+echo was still curling around the mountains the rams crowded around the
+leader as he stood irresolute, his head raised, his nostrils distended
+to test the air. It was he who must say what they should do.
+
+In a minute the old ram turned and came at a light trot across a narrow
+stone abutment that formed a natural bridge between the clearing and
+the adjoining hill where Turgen stood. Without hesitation the other
+rams followed him in single file, males and females alternating.
+Turgen’s lamb was behind his mother and just in front of the male ram
+who brought up the rear. The bridge led to a labyrinth of caves where
+escape was easy. That it led past Turgen seemed a matter of no concern
+to the rams in the face of great danger.
+
+The bridge was no doubt slippery but the rams were sure-footed and they
+did not give way to panic. They were moving in a direction away from
+the gunfire. But Turgen had another plan. He would go toward the place
+from which the shot came. Should he meet the hunter, the hunter would
+understand that he was trespassing and leave the neighborhood--for such
+was the custom. Only one hunter was allowed to a region.
+
+But before Turgen could act on his resolve, there was another shot. The
+ram at the rear of the line, hearing it, jumped, made an incautious
+step, and knocked against the lamb, who fell from the bridge.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 15
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+Turgen’s heart turned in him as he watched the small body hurtle down
+the crevasse. Then, peering over, he saw the lamb lying motionless on
+the mountain slope. Quickly, he made his way to the spot, fearing that
+wild animals would get there first.
+
+The lamb’s eyes, raised to his, were black with terror. It tried
+convulsively to rise but could not.
+
+“Thank God, he’s alive,” was Turgen’s first thought. “There’s a chance
+I can save him.”
+
+With that he stooped and lifted the lamb gently.
+
+“Ma-a,” said the lamb in a weak, childish whimper. And from a distance
+came a mournful answering bleat. “Ma-a! Ma-a!” that might have been the
+old leader. Then fog enveloped the mountain.
+
+The lamb was surprisingly heavy, but Turgen hardly noticed the burden
+in his anxiety and excitement. Carefully he made his way to the yurta
+through the darkness, and as he went he murmured reassurance to his
+patient, who made no further effort to escape.
+
+“It is not far to go. Be quiet. Rest. Do not fear--I’ll do you no
+harm.” Over and over Turgen said it, like a chant.
+
+At the yurta Turgen laid the lamb on some soft pelts to examine him.
+Noticing fresh blood stains, he looked for a wound and found a flesh
+cut under the right front leg. It took but a minute to wash it clean
+and cover it with a poultice of plantain leaves to stop the bleeding.
+
+The lamb’s fright returned now and he struggled to gain his feet. But
+his hind legs would not obey him.
+
+“There, there, lad,” Turgen soothed him with tender strokes and pats.
+“What are you afraid of? I will soon make you well and take you back to
+your family. Who am I but an old man? There is no harm in me. Besides,
+who would dare to lift a hand against such a splendid fellow? Lie
+still. Trust me.”
+
+Pain, weariness, and the strange but unterrifying sound made by a human
+voice finally had their effect. The lamb rested while Turgen explored
+more thoroughly for possible injuries. There were scratches and
+bruises, none of them serious. And one hind leg was plainly swollen.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+“God forbid that it should be broken,” Turgen thought in dismay. For
+he was expert with animals and he knew the difficulty of keeping a wild
+young thing quiet while bone mended.
+
+Fortunately, he found that the injury was no more than a dislocation,
+but extremely painful to the touch. With practiced skill, while the
+patient bleated piteously, he swathed the whole body to keep it
+immobile except for the head. Then, quickly and deftly, he set the
+bone, bandaged the leg and hoof between splints and satisfied himself
+that the lamb could do no harm to the injury should he get on his feet.
+As he worked the lamb regarded him with fixed and startled eyes. It was
+breathing heavily and clearly would have liked to offer resistance.
+
+The bandaging operation finished, the lamb grew calm, fright gave way
+to weariness.
+
+“Why,” Turgen thought. “There is the same look in his eyes that I saw
+in Tim’s when I set his arm. Children are alike. They suffer more from
+fright than pain.” To the lamb he said: “That other little fellow drank
+some milk and fell asleep when I had doctored him. And so should you.”
+
+Fortunately, Turgen had only the day before brought milk from Marfa’s
+cow. It stood untouched in the cellar. He poured some into a large
+wooden bowl and offered it to the lamb. At first the lamb turned his
+head away in distaste, but when by accident a few drops found their
+way into his mouth he smacked his lips with enjoyment. After that he
+drank willingly, with relish, looking at Turgen as if to say: “Really,
+this isn’t bad at all.”
+
+Turgen was beside himself with joy as his charge finished his meal and
+promptly went to sleep.
+
+“Food and attention--that’s all anyone wants,” Turgen reflected. “Just
+food and attention.”
+
+It was late when he himself was ready for bed, and after the agitating
+events of the day he slept fitfully. Whenever he wakened, as he did
+frequently, his first thought was for the lamb--and this stranger in
+his yurta seemed not a wild ram but a person close and dear to him. By
+going to his rescue, Turgen had found someone to share his yurta.
+
+It is true, he marvelled, what our people say: “Misfortune can
+sometimes bring happiness.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 16
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+Man is a changeable creature--despairing one moment, filled with joy
+and confidence the next. “The sun shines differently every day,” was
+the way Turgen’s father had put it, and he found wisdom in the words.
+How different yesterday was from today, he thought upon wakening, and
+all because of two dark eyes full of anxiety which greeted him across
+the room.
+
+Turgen rose, went to the lamb and stroked its head, under the soft
+brown-gray curls were hard knob-like growths which would one day become
+horns. Although the lamb shrank from his touch and tried to hide by
+closing its eyes, it did not struggle as before. Nor did fear prevent
+it from drinking a large bowl of milk for breakfast.
+
+“Oho!” Turgen exclaimed with satisfaction. “Anyone with a hearty
+appetite like yours can not be suffering from internal injuries.”
+
+After the feeding, Turgen washed his patient’s wounds and covered them
+with a mixture of fish oil and tar. “The oil is healing, the smell of
+tar will keep flies and insects away.” This, too, Turgen had learned
+from his father. He thought of freeing the lamb of the bandages, but
+decided “No. He’s too young and frightened to be trusted. He would only
+injure himself more.” As he worked Turgen talked aloud, sometimes to
+himself and sometimes to the lamb but always keeping his voice quiet so
+that the young stranger would not take alarm.
+
+The chores that day were like child’s play, so busy was Turgen’s mind
+with plans. Returning from Marfa’s with a fresh supply of milk for
+Lad, as he called the lamb--he thought, “What good fortune has come
+to me. When Lad gets well I will take him back to the herd myself.”
+And he pictured the reunion of the rams, how Lad would tell his family
+of Turgen’s kindness. Who could say?--the news might even reach the
+ears of the Great Spirit. For Turgen could not forget his dream. He
+was convinced the lamb had come to him for a purpose, as a messenger
+from the old man on the mountain to test Turgen’s devotion. Should he
+receive care and attention, then Turgen at his death would be granted
+permission to enter that world of beauty where his wife and son dwelt,
+where wolves were nurses to creatures supposed to be their natural
+enemies.
+
+Such thoughts made Turgen very happy. It seemed that on this bright and
+sparkling day the birds were gayer, the grass greener, the brook more
+talkative than he had ever known them to be before.
+
+When Lad’s wants had been attended to, Turgen went as usual to the
+Rams’ Mountain with a feeding of hay. To his disappointment no rams
+appeared, though he waited behind his special rock for some time.
+
+“Is it possible they have gone away because of yesterday’s accident?”
+he worried. “No, surely not. They will return. They must. Not just
+because of the food, but to look for the lamb.”
+
+This thought had hardly come to him when he caught sight of the leader
+ram opposite him on the stone bridge. The old fellow moved slowly,
+stopping from time to time to peer into the ravine. There was something
+very forlorn about him and Turgen’s heart went out to him. As he came
+to the middle of the bridge he paused, then on what seemed to be a
+sudden impulse, he turned, leaped and vanished.
+
+Had he gone back to the herd? Turgen wondered. But no. There he was on
+the ledge where the lamb had fallen.
+
+“Eh, poor fellow,” Turgen addressed him silently. “It’s too bad I can’t
+tell you that your boy is alive, that I am caring for him and will soon
+return him to you. Don’t grieve. I will keep my word. And you--you must
+not go away from here.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 17
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+Turgen had but one determination--to see the lamb well again and back
+with his family.
+
+The first few days were difficult. Although Lad was not as fearful and
+suspicious as before, he was restive and tried by every trick to free
+himself of the bandages. At the first opportunity, when the shoulder
+wound began to heal, Turgen removed the wrappings.
+
+Like a flash, Lad sprang to his feet, shook himself, stretched, and
+bounded on to Turgen’s bed. Then a look of astonishment came into his
+eyes as he noticed his wooden leg. After gazing around the yurta he
+turned to Turgen as if to question him.
+
+“Where am I? Who are you? Why do you live in such a tiny cave, where
+there is no room for leaping? And why is my leg so stiff?”
+
+Turgen would have sworn that these were the questions in Lad’s eyes. As
+he filled a bowl with milk he answered softly. “You are surprised, but
+don’t be afraid, boy. That drone, maybe your brother or uncle, who was
+behind you pushed you off the cliff. Remember? You have hurt yourself.
+But in a couple of weeks you will be quite well again. Believe me.”
+
+Lad accepted attention willingly now. He ate and drank with an appetite
+and submitted with evident enjoyment to being petted. But Turgen knew
+that he was not to be trusted too far, so he made a collar and leash
+when he wanted to take the lamb out for exercise.
+
+Upon leaving the yurta for the first time Lad stopped as if
+thunderstruck by the sunlight and the sight of his familiar mountains.
+Intoxicated with delight and longing, he plunged forward but the leash
+held him fast. He turned, called in a piercing voice--“Ma-a, Ma-a....”
+Then, receiving no answer, he jumped and circled desperately in an
+effort to be free.
+
+“Come, come,” said Turgen as he picked up the young savage and carried
+him back to the yurta. “I understand that you are reminded of your home
+and family. You are tired of this dark cage and impatient to be gone.
+But there are things that can’t be rushed. Calm yourself.”
+
+So for the next two days Lad stayed in the yurta while Turgen devoted
+himself to his comfort and was entertained in turn. The lamb learned
+to take his milk with a mixture of barley meal and water. He learned
+that grass was good to eat, and how to distinguish the sweet, tender
+blades from the tough dry ones which pricked and gave no satisfaction.
+Turgen never tired of watching him. To his fond eyes Lad was beautiful
+with his proud little head so like the leader ram’s and soft coat of
+dark brown spotted with white near groin and haunches. A darker streak
+the length of his long face from forehead to nostrils gave him the
+expression of a solemn clown.
+
+“Truly, you are a handsome lad,” Turgen assured him.
+
+Lad loved praise, and did not question anything Turgen told him. Free
+to go where he pleased indoors, he tapped his way boldly about the
+yurta, thrusting his nose into everything, sniffing, examining like a
+curious puppy. Only once did he show fright, when a fir log suddenly
+sputtered in the komelek and sent out a shower of sparks. After that he
+treated the fire with mixed caution and respect.
+
+Yes, Turgen thought, this four-legged wild creature had made his life
+over and filled it with a great content.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 18
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+It was several days before Turgen found time to return to the feeding
+ground with hay for the rams. It troubled him that he had neglected
+them, but in honesty he had to admit that with Lad for company he did
+not think so often of the others. He wondered whether he would miss
+them greatly should they abandon their mountain--providing, of course,
+they left Lad behind.
+
+“But that is a dreadful thought,” he reproached himself the next
+instant. “How could I take advantage of them by robbing them of their
+young one? No, no, I will return him to his family.”
+
+It crossed his mind also that the Great Spirit would be angry if he
+betrayed his trust.
+
+Again the only ram he could see was the leader standing on a rocky
+ledge above him. Turgen imagined that the old fellow was questioning
+him as their glances met. Impulsively he shouted: “It’s all right, my
+friend. The lad is doing well and I will bring him back to you myself
+in a couple of weeks.”
+
+To his pleasure the ram did not shy from his voice but seemed to wait
+for further news of the lost one.
+
+“He knows me. He knows me, and he is not afraid,” Turgen gloated. The
+rams would stay now, he was sure.
+
+Returning home, he was still some distance from the yurta when he heard
+Lad calling “Ma-a! Ma-a!” Just inside the door the lamb was waiting
+with eyes which said accusingly, “You stayed away a long time. Why? I’m
+lonesome and I’m hungry.”
+
+Not a movement escaped the sharp young eyes as Turgen busied himself
+preparing food, and everywhere Turgen went Lad came clumping behind
+him. There was no doubt he had been alarmed by Turgen’s absence and
+welcomed him home.
+
+“Eh, my darling, you are very clever,” Turgen complimented him. And to
+test him further he called the little savage by name: “Lad, Lad.”
+
+Lad cocked his head attentively, which was the only sign Turgen needed
+that they understood each other well.
+
+A few days later Turgen examined the lamb’s injuries to satisfy himself
+that the dislocation was mending properly and there was no infection,
+but it was a week or more before he decided that it was safe to
+remove the splints. Lad was at first bewildered, then surprised,
+then delighted. He leaped on the bed and down again. He pranced and
+pirouetted. But when Turgen later took him for a walk he showed no
+desire to run away. He was happy with the day which was as perfect as
+September sometimes brings to the Far North. He was happy with the
+limited freedom he was permitted on the end of his leash. Joyously he
+danced and flung himself into the air, lowered his head to the ground
+and kicked his legs high. And when he had had his fill he came to
+Turgen of his own accord singing “Ma-a, Ma-a ...” in a voice warm with
+contentment.
+
+Gladly this time he followed Turgen back to the yurta, and entered as
+if the place belonged to him. A little later, having finished a hearty
+meal, he folded his legs under him and fell sound asleep. Just like any
+healthy infant, thought Turgen with pride.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 19
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+Reasoning that a child can tell you when he is in pain and where the
+pain is, but an animal can not, Turgen watched intently to make sure
+that Lad ate and drank as he should and regularly fulfilled the demands
+of nature. By this time he was fully assured that the lamb did not
+suffer internal injuries. It was a pleasant duty Turgen performed,
+making certain that this wild young thing survived its mishap, and when
+occasionally he saw the old ram scrutinizing him inquisitively from the
+mountainside he thought that the Great Spirit himself might be keeping
+just as watchful an eye on him. “To see that I carry out His wishes.”
+
+Does it seem strange that the old ram and the Great Spirit of Turgen’s
+dream appeared to him sometimes as one and the same person? It was not
+strange to Turgen, who believed quite simply that the Great Spirit was
+everywhere at all times. “Only man is too busy during the day to visit
+with Him. Therefore He comes at night to call bringing new faith and
+strength.” Surely He was powerful enough to take the shape of a ram if
+He so desired.
+
+Such thoughts comforted Turgen and softened his dread of having to part
+with Lad.
+
+With freedom to move about, young Lad joyfully took over the yurta.
+Each day he became more attached to Turgen, following at his heels like
+a dog as he went about his chores. The clearing outside the yurta he
+also considered to be his special province and he made no move to run
+away even when he was once allowed to go without collar or leash.
+
+His eyes questioned sometimes when the day was clear and the breeze
+fresh off the hills: “Tell me--what of my family?” And at such times
+Turgen answered: “They are well, believe me. And you are remembered. I
+see the old ram often. When you return you must assure him that I was
+good to you.” When Lad shook his head, pirouetted and leaped for glee,
+Turgen took his antics to mean: “Ay--I certainly will.”
+
+It was one day when Lad was frolicking in the clearing and dancing
+on his hind legs that the drunkard Nikita happened along and saw
+him. Mistaking the lamb for the devil, Nikita fled shouting down the
+mountain while Lad, equally alarmed by the strange voice, rushed to
+Turgen for protection.
+
+Turgen guessed the cause of Nikita’s terror. “What a fool!” he remarked
+to the flying figure. “Now he will spread more lies about me. But what
+can one do? To shoot at a rock is but a waste of arrows.”
+
+That same evening Marfa reported the excitement in the valley when
+Nikita spread the news of what he had seen. “He was like a madman,”
+she said sharply, “shouting that he saw you at play with the devil and
+the devil must be killed. When I noticed people listening to him, I
+gave them a piece of my mind. I told them what they already knew if
+their heads were not stuffed with hay--that there isn’t a better man
+among them than you. No, nor a better hunter or fisherman. They are
+envious--that is all. So they believe an idler whose words are worth
+nothing. With his drunken eyes he saw a wild ram. Tphoo! Of course he
+lied.”
+
+Tim and Aksa looked at their mother in amazement. This was not the
+gentle woman they knew.
+
+Turgen shook his head regretfully. “Thank you, Marfa, but you shouldn’t
+fret yourself so. Remember that dry mud won’t stick to a wall. And to
+listen to gossip is like bailing out water with a sieve. It is true
+that Nikita saw a wild ram lamb with me. Not a full grown ram but a
+lamb which fell from a cliff and was injured. Since I have been caring
+for him he has become almost tame. That is all. There is no sorcery
+about it. Perhaps I should have told you. But as you know, I am not
+much of a talker.”
+
+Tim and Aksa listened, their eyes burning with curiosity and
+excitement. They were afraid to ask questions before their mother’s
+anger had cooled.
+
+Marfa herself was surprised by what Turgen told her, but after a
+moment’s thought she declared vehemently, “Well, what’s so remarkable
+about your caring for a poor little lamb? The fools might better wonder
+at your kindness and your skill than spread these silly stories. And I
+shall tell them so.”
+
+Marfa shook her fist as warning to those “dumb ones.” Then to the
+children’s delight she asked Turgen to stay for a cup of tea. Now they
+would hear more about Turgen’s surprising guest. A mountain lamb!
+Surely this was the finest of all possible treasures. But to their
+disappointment Turgen was not in a mood to talk, and in fear of their
+mother they held their itching tongues.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 20
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+Walking home that evening, Turgen was troubled as he thought over what
+Marfa had told him.
+
+“Such silly tattle can do me no harm,” he reasoned, “but what if
+someone takes it into his stupid head to sneak up the hill and shoot
+Lad? So long as he stays with me there will be this danger. I must give
+him back to his family as quickly as possible. There in the mountains
+he will have protection.”
+
+The resolution did not make him happy, especially when he saw how Lad
+welcomed him and clung to him.
+
+“How strange,” Turgen thought, “that a wild animal can understand
+affection while people, who should be wiser, can not.”
+
+For a long time he could not fall asleep but tossed from side to
+side thinking of the empty days ahead when he would be alone again.
+Weariness finally won, however, just as he was praying: “Great Spirit,
+have pity on me ... help me ... teach me.”
+
+Then Turgen dreamed. In his dream it was raining and there were loud
+crashes of thunder following upon lightning. He went out of the yurta
+just in time to see the Great Spirit rush past. But so swift was his
+flight that Turgen had no time to utter a word. Bitterly disappointed,
+he returned indoors, thinking, “Evidently I am unworthy to talk to Him.”
+
+But hardly had he lain down again when someone knocked on the door.
+
+“Come in, come in,” Turgen called, and the door opened to admit a
+gray-haired old man who looked strangely like himself. He carried a
+staff in his hand and a pack on his back.
+
+The visitor bowed, saying, “Thank you, Turgen, for your invitation. It
+is raining and I am tired. You live so far from me.”
+
+Turgen, delighted to have company, begged his guest, “Come, sit closer
+to the fire, friend, and rest yourself. I will get you something to
+eat.” Then, struck by the old man’s appearance, he added: “Why do you
+climb mountains in this weather at your age? You’re not strong enough
+for that. You see my yurta--it is spacious and I live here alone,
+except for this lamb. But I must return him soon to his family. Won’t
+you stay and make your home with me?”
+
+It didn’t surprise Turgen that Lad awoke just then, jumped from his
+corner, and going over to the visitor placed his head on the old man’s
+knees. The visitor stroked him as he said, “You are a good boy and you
+fell into the hands of a good man.”
+
+Turgen, rejoicing at such praise, replied: “The lamb and his family are
+a worry to me because people hunt them, even though they are harmless.
+It is my belief that they should be allowed to live in freedom and
+peace like....” He was about to say, “like the birds and beasts who
+dwell with the Great Spirit,” but something told him that his guest
+already knew what was in his mind for he was nodding. “There is a
+whole tribe of wild rams not far from here,” Turgen went on. “Splendid
+animals. While I am alive I’ll see that no one molests them. But I am
+old and alone. Who will look after them when I die?”
+
+Instead of giving him the sympathy he expected, the old man burst out
+in anger: “Alone, alone! And whose fault is that? Your own. Happiness
+is right under your nose, but you don’t see it. You are blind as a bat!
+Why don’t you ask Marfa and her children to share your yurta with you?
+She is a fine woman, and so are the children.”
+
+“You know,” Turgen replied, taken aback, “I never thought of that. But
+it is not yet too late.”
+
+“Don’t wait too long,” the visitor advised him. “Inquire of your heart
+and act as it prompts you. In such matters the heart is better than the
+head.”
+
+Turgen started to say that he agreed but would have to consult
+Marfa--and what would the Yakuts say who called him a sorcerer?
+
+But the old man answered him before he could speak: “Don’t let this
+disturb you. Marfa and the children will be delighted. As for the
+Yakuts--don’t pay any attention to them. It is not that they are evil,
+only ignorant. Believe me.”
+
+At this moment, before he could thank the visitor for his advice,
+Turgen awoke. So real was his dream that he could not rid himself of
+it. “Amazing,” he murmured. “A miracle.”
+
+The yurta was quiet. The fire in the komelek was dying. The lamb slept
+peacefully in his corner.
+
+Being a man of simple faith, Turgen did not doubt that the dream was
+a sign given him by unknown powers. Had he wanted to ask Marfa before
+to bring the children and share his yurta? If so, he would never have
+found the courage alone to speak to her of his desire. The dream made
+everything simple and right. He had begged the Great Spirit for help,
+and help was given him in the form of advice. Now he had only to act.
+
+It was Lad who roused Turgen from his reflections by butting him gently
+and crying, “Ma-a, Ma-a....”
+
+“Yes, yes,” he agreed. “It is nearly daylight and time to get up and
+you are hungry. Come, we’ll have breakfast and off we’ll go.”
+
+Although it was the last meal they would have together, Turgen was not
+sad. Two thoughts were uppermost in his mind: Lad was going back to his
+family where he belonged, and Turgen would soon have a family of his
+own to love and care for.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 21
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+Resolutely Turgen set off for the feeding ground with a bundle of
+hay slung over his shoulder and the lamb skipping along by his side.
+They might have been out for one of their usual walks. But as they
+approached the clearing Turgen noted how the lamb hesitated and looked
+about him expectantly.
+
+“Something tells him that he has been in this place before,” thought
+Turgen. The thought made him happy and filled him with inner peace....
+
+Suddenly Lad turned sharply and sang out in his youthful voice--“Ma-a,
+Ma-a.”
+
+In reply came the same call, but more strongly and Turgen, searching
+the cliffs, saw the old ram standing in his full magnificence as if
+frozen to the rocky promontory. There was amazement in the look he
+directed at the man and the returned lamb.
+
+Turgen shouted: “Come, old man. Come here and accept your son. You
+see, I did bring him back to you. As you can see, he is well and happy.”
+
+In answer, the ram raised his head and sent a bellow--“Ma-a,
+ma-a”--echoing around the hills. Joy, surprise, and anxiety were in
+his voice, Turgen understood. For how could this savage be expected to
+trust his old enemy man?
+
+While the ram stood there irresolute, not quite able to believe his
+eyes, Lad whirled in a frenzy of excitement and started toward the
+cliff. Memory guided him and he ran along the same stone bridge from
+which he had fallen. But Turgen had no fear for him now. “Take care of
+yourself, Lad,” he called. “Good-by, my dear!”
+
+Upon hearing his voice the lamb stopped briefly to send back an
+affectionate--“Ma-a, ma-a.” It was both “Good-by” and “Thank you.” With
+that he disappeared around a bend.
+
+For a moment both rams were lost to view. Then they reappeared on the
+cliff together--the old fellow and the youngster who was so like him.
+
+Turgen greeted them joyfully: “I can see that you are glad to have Lad
+back and safe. He will tell you that people are not all evil.”
+
+The rams answered him in soft chorus, and vanished. But they would
+return--again and again. Of that Turgen was certain. There was a pact
+between them now that could not be broken. Turgen would feed the family
+and protect them from hunters. The old ram, so wise and strong, would
+guard the herd against other enemies such as wolves and bears.
+
+“Until some day Lad grows up and takes his place as leader,” Turgen
+promised. He was confident that he could foretell this much of the
+future.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 22
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+Turgen had known Marfa as a friend for many years, but it had never
+entered his head to suggest that she and her children share his life.
+Now here he was on his way to her, his mind filled with this very idea.
+Yet the nearer he came to her yurta the more absurd he appeared to
+himself. He was tortured with doubts.
+
+What was a man of his age to say to her? “Look Marfa--I live alone,
+make my own fires, do my own cooking and sewing, and worry about no one
+but myself. It’s not natural. So I have come to ask you to be my wife.”
+
+Certainly a sensible woman like Marfa could only say, “Why, you old
+fogey, are you out of your senses? What would the neighbors think if I
+went to live with you, whom they consider a sorcerer?”
+
+Such thoughts made Turgen’s legs grow cold and his feet drag. Still,
+he reminded himself, he was following a dream. The Great Spirit had
+spoken to him, and he believed.
+
+Nothing was as he imagined it. Perhaps it was that heart spoke to
+heart. At any rate, the moment he entered the yurta, Marfa gave one
+glance at him and exclaimed:
+
+“Turgen, your face shines like a nicely polished copper kettle!
+Something wonderful must have happened to you! Is that true? Tell me.”
+
+Turgen thought, “How could I have doubted my dream? I did not know how
+to speak and she has prompted me. But I’ll lead up to the question
+gradually.”
+
+To Marfa he said: “You see, today I returned Lad to his family. I
+fulfilled the promise made to the Great Spirit. It was good, don’t you
+think?”
+
+“Yes,” Marfa answered, perplexed, “but why are you so happy? I thought
+you were very much attached to him. And now you’ll be alone again.”
+
+“Yes, Marfa, but listen. I rejoice because the wild rams are my own. I
+have had a sign. They will stay and I will look after them. Don’t you
+understand that the Great Spirit himself has talked to me and thanked
+me?”
+
+“Wait, wait, Turgen,” Marfa interrupted. “I don’t understand a word of
+what you’re saying. I believe in the good spirits, but I can’t say that
+I have ever talked with them. I’ve never even seen them in a dream.
+Are you sure you are in your right mind?” There was anxiety in her
+voice.
+
+Turgen smiled as he said firmly, “I am not out of my mind. Listen
+to this--” And he told her from beginning to end how he had become
+interested in the starving rams, how he had tended them and saved the
+lamb. He told her too about his marvelous dreams. It seemed to him that
+never before in his life had he been so eloquent.
+
+Toward the end, looking at Marfa’s attentive, smiling face, Turgen knew
+without doubt that she understood everything he would say.
+
+When he had finished she put her hand on his head affectionately as if
+he were one of her children and said: “You are a good man, Turgen....
+And your dreams are good, too. I wish nothing better for myself or for
+the children. I know that they love you. We will all be happy. And once
+we are living as husband and wife, people will stop their evil gossip.”
+
+She turned to Tim and Aksa, who were listening with curiosity and
+whispering to each other. “Children, Turgen will live with us from now
+on. Are you glad?”
+
+“Yes, yes!” they answered, their voices eager, their eyes sparkling.
+They were delighted.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 23
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+That was a day of gayety and laughter for all of them. When Turgen left
+toward evening, Aksa who was more talkative and more inquisitive than
+her brother asked her mother,
+
+“Now that Turgen belongs to us, will we go to live in his yurta?”
+
+“No, daughter,” Marfa replied. “We will live here, for he has not
+enough room for us, and up in the mountains there is no food for a cow.
+In the summer we can visit him.”
+
+This did not entirely please the children, who hoped that their new
+life would be full of change and excitement. To live in the mountains,
+which they did not know except from the valley, would be wonderful. But
+grown-ups could not be expected to understand.
+
+“I want to look at the sky from the top of a mountain,” Aksa declared.
+“Turgen says that good children can see angels in the sky. But I would
+be happy just to see their wings.”
+
+Tim spoke up firmly: “And I want to see Lad and the other rams.”
+
+“So do I,” Aksa added quickly, not to be left out.
+
+Marfa smiled. “Turgen is coming again early tomorrow morning, and if
+you ask him he might take you home with him for a visit. If the weather
+is warm you can even stay over night.”
+
+“Oh, Mama!” the children exclaimed. “Will you ask him, too?”
+
+“Of course.”
+
+That night the children prayed that the next day would be warm and
+Turgen would accept them as his guests, so it did not surprise them
+upon wakening to find the day bright and their friend bending over them.
+
+“Dress yourselves, children,” Turgen said, smiling, “I am very glad to
+take you with me if you think you can stand the walk uphill.”
+
+“Oh, we can. We are good walkers,” they answered him.
+
+Soon they were ready for what was their first adventure away from home.
+Marfa gave them milk to take along, with barley cakes and dried fish.
+
+A twisted path led up the mountain. Turgen walked in front, with Aksa
+behind him, and Tim bringing up the rear. The path followed a talkative
+little brook and all around was heavy shrubbery with tall fir trees,
+larches, and graceful white birches for background. Their progress was
+slow because the children must stop every few steps to pick and eat
+some of the black and red currants and bird-cherry berries so tasty
+this time of year.
+
+Birds overhead twittered so noisily that Aksa asked Turgen seriously,
+“What do you think? Are they rejoicing because we are here?”
+
+“I wouldn’t be surprised,” he answered just as seriously. “It is well
+known that birds like good children.”
+
+Everything amazed the children. The familiar brook was brighter,
+swifter, more mysterious in this higher ground. The woods held
+fascinations and terrors they could only imagine. Never having
+been far away from their yurta in the valley, they were--thanks to
+Turgen--entering a brand-new world. If they stopped frequently, it was
+not only because of the berries or because they were tired, but because
+they needed time to take in all the wonders. From up here the valley
+was a different place than they had known--like a child’s plaything
+laid out in squares of green and brown, with the brook wending through
+it, a silver thread.
+
+“How close it is!” they marveled. “And we thought we had walked a long
+way. Close and small.”
+
+“Yes,” Turgen said, as they strained their eyes to find their yurta at
+the bend of the river, “we live only four miles apart. From a mountain
+everything appears clearer.”
+
+The path grew steeper the nearer they came to Turgen’s place, and care
+had to be taken to avoid loose stones and trees blown down in a storm.
+But neither Aksa nor Tim lagged behind their host. They were so happy
+to have all of his attention, so eager for what was coming next, that
+they could think of a hundred things to say. Aksa especially was very
+inquisitive.
+
+“Turgen,” she asked, “why do you live in the mountains instead of the
+valley, like us?”
+
+“Why? I don’t know myself,” Turgen answered. “We Lamuts always prefer
+to live in the mountains near water. We aren’t like the Yakuts who need
+good grazing grounds for their horses and cows. Look at me. I have
+nothing except two guns, fishing tackle and my strong legs. I don’t
+even own a dog. Most Lamuts are poor. It seems to be our fate. Besides,
+there aren’t many of us left. Here--I’m the only one. There was another
+family lived here several years ago, but they moved.”
+
+“Why?” Tim wanted to know.
+
+“I can’t say, my boy. Just as a fish seeks deeper water, so a man looks
+for a place that will be better for him. Only happiness does not lie in
+changing one place for another, but in belonging to a fine family like
+yours.”
+
+Turgen patted Aksa’s head as he spoke.
+
+“Didn’t you have a family before?” she questioned.
+
+When Turgen answered her his face was sober. “Yes, but they went away,
+leaving me alone.”
+
+“To what place did they go?” the girl persisted.
+
+But Turgen could not talk about this. “To the place all people must go.
+It is too soon for you to understand.”
+
+Before Aksa could open her mouth for another question, Tim pulled her
+painfully by her braid, saying, “We are now your family. So Mama said.
+I will live with you, Turgen, forever.”
+
+“And so will I!” Aksa hastened to add.
+
+“Splendid!” Turgen said, the smile coming back to his eyes. “And now
+that is settled we must get to the end of our journey.”
+
+Tim, wanting to distract attention from a subject that was plainly not
+to Turgen’s liking, and also because he was bursting with questions
+of his own, blurted out: “Is it true what people say, that you are
+friendly with wild rams?” When Turgen showed no sign of distaste for
+this subject, he rushed on: “I can hardly believe that rams will let
+you come close to them. From what I hear, they run faster than the wind
+and can jump from one mountain to another. It is difficult even to see
+them. We have never seen them--not Mama nor Aksa nor I. Are they really
+so smart that they know of danger before it comes near them? People
+also say--”
+
+The boy broke off sharply.
+
+“That I am a sorcerer and bewitched. Is that what people say?” Turgen
+finished for him. But his expression was kind.
+
+Tim nodded. “This we don’t believe.”
+
+“Good. People will always talk a lot of nonsense when they haven’t
+anything better to do.” Turgen shook his head. “More’s the pity. But
+since you are interested I will tell you what I know of the rams. What
+you hear is part true and part exaggeration. Yes, Lad was my friend.
+I cannot say as much for the old rams who are still fearful because
+I am a man. And why should they love us who hunt them down?” Turgen
+hesitated. “Later I will tell you more. And tomorrow, if you should
+happen to wake up early, and the day is bright, you will be able to see
+the rams for yourself on top of that cliff over there.” He pointed to
+the one opposite his yurta.
+
+Aksa and Tim clapped their hands and whirled with joy. “Will you,
+Turgen? Oh, will you? We will do anything you say, and get up very
+early.”
+
+A sight of the rams was worth any promise.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 24
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+Anything new has a special wonder. Tim and Aksa had never been in a
+yurta like Turgen’s before and they had to explore every nook and
+corner. The mountains hovering over it were giants standing guard. The
+tiny window which with difficulty let in light might have belonged to a
+playhouse they built for their own amusement.
+
+Listening to them exclaim and argue and laugh, Turgen prepared dinner.
+Here and there, in and out, the children ran like busy moles. Secretly
+they hoped for a glimpse of the mountain rams that same night. Yet they
+were willing to wait, for Turgen had promised. It would be hard to say
+whether Turgen or his guests were happier.
+
+Dinner was a feast. There was ukha or fish-soup which they drank out of
+wooden bowls, there was also fat fish and pheasants roasted on a spit.
+And to top it all was tea with ... sugar! Yes, it was a real feast,
+something to tell their mother about.
+
+Yet the children’s real joy that day came not so much from the trip up
+the mountain and the good food as from the attention Turgen paid them.
+They were not used to this. Their mother, they knew, loved them, but
+she was always so busy looking after them that she had little time to
+play with them. Here was Turgen ready to devote a whole evening and day
+to them.
+
+And this was not all. They would hear the story of the rams.
+
+Their stomachs so full that it seemed they must burst, Tim and Aksa
+waited while Turgen cleared away the meal. He then went to the door and
+stood looking out. They understood that he was hoping for a glimpse of
+his rams.
+
+“Can’t see a thing,” he said finally, turning back to the room and
+closing the door against the cold air. “What do you say to some more
+logs on the fire?”
+
+The children nodded.
+
+Soon flames were dancing in the komelek, the room was snug and warm.
+Turgen lit his pipe and smiled at his guests, well pleased with them
+and the day. He was content now to sit in silence and enjoy the
+comfort. But not Aksa.
+
+“Turgen, is it true that you are old?” she wanted to know. Then, seeing
+him smile, she hastened to add, “Mama says that only your hair is
+old--that you are strong and walk the earth as lightly as a mountain
+ram.”
+
+Turgen’s face showed his pleasure. “A clever girl,” he thought, and was
+not surprised by her next question: “You haven’t forgotten your promise
+to tell us about yourself and the rams?”
+
+He shook his head. “How could I forget? It is all so close to my heart.”
+
+With that he began to talk. He started with the time long ago when he
+had been young and happy, told of his struggles and adventures and
+marriage. When he came to the death of his wife and son, Aksa and Tim
+shed tears for him in his loneliness. The next moment they were all
+smiles again as he described finding the rams who brought new meaning
+to his life. But most exciting was the account of his remarkable
+dreams. Here Aksa began to fidget on the bench by the fire and pressed
+close to Tim, who sat motionless with his mouth open, his unblinking
+eyes fixed on Turgen.
+
+To them it was not a dream that Turgen had visited the Great Spirit and
+later entertained him as a mysterious wanderer. They accepted it all
+as something which had really happened and their admiration for Turgen
+was unbounded.
+
+“As I see it,” Turgen declared in conclusion, “the Great Spirit gave
+me a love for these rams as a gift for my old age. Then, pleased that
+I cared for them according to His bidding, He blessed me with a fine
+family.”
+
+The children jumped up, ran to Turgen and embraced him. Their eyes were
+full of love, their heads full of questions.
+
+“Now, together, we can protect our herd,” Turgen said with satisfaction.
+
+“But how?” asked Tim.
+
+“Quite simply,” Turgen replied. “We have a custom which says that only
+one hunter is permitted in a district. As I live and hunt here, and do
+not molest the rams, they are safe.”
+
+“But if you do not come close to them,” Tim persisted, “how can you be
+sure they are the same rams you knew long ago?”
+
+Turgen hesitated. “That I can’t know for certain, my boy, but a bird
+can be followed by its flight, and an animal by its tracks. I saw their
+tracks more than once. The same family? Maybe. Maybe not. One thing I
+know well, that rams love to return to their native haunts. Naturally,
+they avoided me, for how could they know I was their friend? Their life
+was very difficult.”
+
+Aksa’s eyes asked a question.
+
+“Why? Food is scarce and the rams have many enemies: people the most
+dangerous of all. They can fight a wolf, run away from a bear, but
+a hunter’s bullet is faster than their legs. So they hide among the
+mountain cliffs. And what kind of food is there? In summer, a little
+grass and a few thin shrubs--in winter, nothing but half-frozen twigs
+and old dry moss. Not very nourishing. It is no wonder the poor
+creatures die out.”
+
+Tim, who had been listening intently, now blurted out: “I think they
+must be stupid to live in such places. All they have to do is come to
+lower ground where there is plenty of food.”
+
+“On the contrary,” Turgen told him, “they are smart. Where they live
+there is sand and gravel and loose stones to warn them of the approach
+of an enemy. Have you ever tried to walk quietly on gravel?... Well!
+The rams had their choice--to live in terror of their lives below where
+there is food, or to go hungry and free. The dead need nothing. They
+chose to live and be free. In their independence they remind me of my
+own people--the Lamuts. We too are dying out, but we are free.”
+
+“The poor rams,” Aksa commented. “During a snow storm we keep a fire
+burning day and night, but they have no way to warm themselves.”
+
+“Yes,” Tim agreed. “And even with fire and food we do not have an easy
+time of it in winter.”
+
+Pleased to have aroused the sympathy of his young guests, Turgen
+replied, “It is impossible not to pity these fine savages. Fortunately,
+God has provided them with some things to help them in their struggle.
+They are strong, have great endurance, and towards winter their wool
+becomes thick and long. Moreover they are intelligent. You see how I
+built my yurta between cliffs. In winter everything is so covered with
+snow that there is not a chink for the wind to enter in. And wind is
+far more dangerous than frost. The rams know this, so they seek for
+themselves caves in the mountains where they too will be protected from
+the wind. Their great misfortune is hunger.”
+
+Tim considered a moment. “Is there no way to help them?”
+
+“If we would, yes,” Turgen answered. “I have heard that in other
+countries rare animals are protected by law. It is forbidden to hunt
+them. But we have no such law, even for animals as rare and harmless as
+these.”
+
+“We could tame them and use them,” Tim offered. “One of our neighbors
+has sheep and I have heard that mountain rams are wild sheep.”
+
+Turgen shook his head. “So are dogs related to wolves. But there is
+a proverb: No matter how much you feed a wolf, he will still long for
+the woods. I have never seen or heard of a tame wolf. Wild rams are not
+wolves, but it is impossible to tame them.”
+
+“What about Lad? You tamed him,” Aksa interrupted.
+
+“That is right. But Lad was very young, and at the time I got him he
+was helpless. For a time he was satisfied to stay with me, but you
+should have seen how eagerly he rushed to his father the instant he
+heard his voice! When I called he turned his head and looked at me.
+That was all.”
+
+“Ah, how ungrateful!” Aksa exclaimed.
+
+“It is not a question of gratitude at all. Imagine that you were lost
+in the woods and hurt yourself. Someone found you and took care of you.
+Then suddenly you saw your mother.... Wouldn’t you run to her?”
+
+Aksa’s eyes opened wide. “But Mother and I are people,” she objected.
+
+“So,” Turgen nodded, smiling. “But animals too have a feeling for their
+own kind.”
+
+Tim now came to his sister’s defense. “I think Lad should have stayed
+with you. Then he would have been warm and well fed.”
+
+Turgen answered with a question: “Would you leave your mother who is
+poor to live in the yurta of a rich neighbor?”
+
+“Oh, no, no!”
+
+“I didn’t expect any other answer,” Turgen told the boy. “Our own
+family always comes first. And sooner or later, looking at the
+mountains, Lad would have been seized with longing to be there with the
+other mountain rams. Only by force could I have kept him. Then, maybe,
+by the second or the third generation....”
+
+“Why didn’t you?” Tim wanted to know.
+
+“Keep him by force? No. Better he should live in freedom.” Turgen
+paused, and added, “Besides, I was afraid.”
+
+“Afraid!” Aksa exclaimed in disbelief. “What were you afraid of?”
+
+“The Great Spirit might have been angry,” Turgen explained, “had I not
+given the lamb back to his family. I feared too that the people from
+below might come and kill. If they could believe he was a devil in
+disguise, they could do anything. There in the mountains he is safer.
+It is where he belongs.”
+
+Turgen rose. “Now come. It is time to sleep if you want to see my rams
+in the morning. They come to gather on that near cliff at sunrise.”
+
+After a day of such excitements, with the hope of more to come,
+the children had hardly time to cover themselves with blankets and
+quickly say a prayer than they were asleep. Turgen did not follow them
+immediately but sat smoking by the fire. His face reflected joy in his
+new fortune. In his heart too was a prayer.
+
+“I thank Thee for the gift of this fine family, and for your goodness
+to my rams who are also dear to me. Teach people to let them live in
+peace. For nothing is impossible to Thee.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 25
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+Turgen was wakened next morning by the cold rushing in through the
+chimney of the now dead komelek. He jumped out of bed, revived the
+fire, put water to boil for tea and then stepped out of the yurta.
+
+Before him were the mountains enveloped in a thick white-gray fog. He
+peered in the direction of the cliff where he expected the rams, but
+could see nothing. Anxiously he waited. They must come! The fog must
+lift! He had promised the children.
+
+When the rising sun sent its first golden threadlike rays into the sky,
+slowly, slowly the fog moved up the mountains. Fearing to miss a moment
+Turgen shouted from the door of the yurta: “Tim! Aksa! Get up! It is
+time!”
+
+The children scrambled from their beds and still in their bare feet
+rushed to join Turgen. With eyes opened wide to miss nothing of the
+spectacle, they saw for the first time day break over the mountains.
+It was a dazzling sight. And as the mist gave way before the power of
+the sun, there were the rams--shadowy silhouettes, then the whole herd
+seen sharp and clear.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+The leader was standing in front by himself, with the others ranged
+around him. They were posed as for a show.
+
+“Look,” Turgen was saying. “There beside the old fellow is my Lad. See,
+he is looking straight at us. I am certain he has told them about us.”
+
+“Oh, they are beautiful!” Aksa exclaimed.
+
+To her, their beauty was enough. But Tim’s thoughts went farther. “I
+hope they will always come to this mountain,” he said.
+
+“They will if we care for them and love them,” Turgen assured him.
+
+The three stood without moving, watching as the leader ram signalled to
+the herd and led them down the mountain out of sight. Even then they
+were reluctant to let the moment go. The rams and the mountain against
+the red-gold sky was something to keep forever.
+
+Tim broke the silence, and his voice was a little sad: “Eh, Turgen, I
+do want them to live in health so that we can enjoy them if only from
+a distance. God save them from hunger and cold and wild beasts and
+hunters.”
+
+“So long as I live,” Turgen answered, “they will eat well and be safe
+from hunters. But what will become of them after I die? This is my
+worry.”
+
+Impulsively Tim caught Turgen by the arm. “Then I will feed and
+protect them. I promise you.”
+
+“And I, and I, too!” Aksa exclaimed.
+
+Turgen put his arm around the children. “Wonderful!” he said. “You make
+me very happy. Feed the rams, love and protect them. The Good Spirit
+will reward you for it, as He has rewarded me.”
+
+Indeed, at that moment Turgen felt himself to be the happiest of men.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 26
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+Wings of happiness lifted Turgen’s spirit in the days immediately
+following his understanding with Marfa, until it seemed that the
+world was a new and more beautiful place. He looked at the sky, the
+mountains and the forest around him with eyes that appeared to see them
+for the first time. Even his yurta, so dark and cramped, was larger
+and brighter, though its solitary window was still covered with snow.
+In the silence surrounding him he caught sounds of life filled with
+excitement and promise.
+
+“Is not all this a dream?” he asked himself. Then his common sense
+answered: “No, it is not a dream, or there would be fear in my heart
+that it would vanish. And my heart does not fear.”
+
+He was very gay as he climbed the mountain to the clearing with food
+for his rams. The herd kept out of sight, but he felt their presence
+close by in the shelter of the cliffs.
+
+“Hey there, my friends,” he shouted, “don’t hide yourselves!” And then,
+because he had to confide his news to someone: “Life has now turned
+her face to us and everything is going to be well. We are no longer
+orphans. I will have a family, and it will be your family, too. Already
+Tim and Aksa love you. And they have made me a promise. As for their
+mother! Oh, that is a woman with a heart. The Great Spirit has blessed
+us indeed.”
+
+Turgen delivered his message with full confidence that the rams heard
+and understood all that he said, and rejoiced in his good fortune. He
+knew the proverb, “Every man forges his own happiness,” but his case
+seemed to be an exception. For what had he done, he asked himself, that
+he should be so blessed? Was it all, perhaps, a sign from the stranger
+who came to him in his dream?
+
+For three days his thoughts were rose-colored. But no mood will last
+forever. Gradually doubts crept back into his mind and by feeding on
+solitude grew into monsters.
+
+“What kind of an old fool am I to be thinking of marriage at my age?”
+they went. “How do I dare take on the responsibility of a family? Not
+that I am unable to provide for them. But why should innocent people
+have to share with me the ill-will of the Yakuts in the valley?”
+
+Marfa was a fine brave woman. She and the children scoffed at the idea
+that he was a sorcerer. But they didn’t know what it meant to have
+their neighbors against them.
+
+What was he to do? How could he explain all this to Marfa and make her
+understand that his fears were for her and not himself?
+
+That was the whole problem--to convince Marfa. It would require wisdom.
+And where was he to find wisdom of the kind needed? Oh, what a muddle
+it was, and all because of his pity for the mountain rams. How was it
+possible that so much evil could come from good?
+
+While his mind worried itself in this fashion Turgen went about his
+daily chores hoping that the Great Spirit would grant him still another
+sign, and save him before the final moment of decision. There was much
+work to be done. There were the fishing nets in the lake to watch.
+There was game to be hunted, and snares to be examined from time to
+time. Also he had promised to sew new moccasin boots for Tim and Aksa.
+Then on the following Sunday he would return to Marfa’s, when she
+expected to decide upon the day for the wedding.
+
+What this wedding would be like Turgen did not know. He remembered very
+well his first marriage, which had taken place early in the autumn.
+Several couples gathered outside the chapel and were united by one
+ceremony. There was a small table holding a cross and a bowl of water.
+A person called a monk read a prayer, sprinkled holy water over them,
+and invited them to kiss the cross. Then a man wearing glasses wrote
+down their names--and that was all. This had been long ago--so long
+ago. How would it be now if Marfa was not persuaded by his reasoning?
+
+It was good to be busy, for then he could not think too much.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 27
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+Early Saturday morning Kamov was due to call with provisions. Turgen
+knew that he had a credit with the merchant amounting to more than
+three hundred roubles. Add to this the value of the pelts he had on
+hand, and the sum would be about five hundred roubles. A lot of money.
+It would buy not only necessary supplies but dress goods for Marfa and
+the children.
+
+“It might be well also,” he thought, “to get another cow and a good
+horse.” For though he reasoned with himself against the marriage, he
+could not give up hope. The merchant was a man to be trusted. He would
+ask his advice.
+
+That night Turgen tossed in his sleep and his dreams were troubled. He
+dozed, wakened, dozed again and heard himself mutter: “But I cannot let
+the poor creatures starve in order to convince stupid people that I am
+not a friend of the devil. What kind of happiness would I have? No and
+no!”
+
+And then to his surprise he saw Lad at the door of the yurta, looking
+at him with affection and saying in a human voice: “Why don’t you
+sleep, Turgen? You know that I and my parents, and indeed the entire
+herd, are praying for you. Sleep. All will be well.”
+
+Turgen sprang from his bed, rubbed his eyes and looked around the
+yurta. No one was there. Logs crackled in the komelek, the room was
+warm and snug. Stepping outside the door he looked at the moon and
+stars, worlds away, making bright patterns in the night-black sky. A
+wonder, but distant from his thoughts just now. “Merciful God,” he
+whispered as he turned back, “what is wrong with me? Am I ill that such
+strange things haunt me?”
+
+Suddenly something came over him, a feeling of peace and well-being
+which seemed to promise that though he could not know the answers to
+all his questioning, they would be revealed in good time. The Great
+Spirit was on guard and would see to it. So, reassured, he fell asleep.
+
+When Kamov arrived in the morning, Turgen greeted him cordially and
+set about preparing refreshments. Outwardly he was calm but he had
+difficulty keeping mind on what the merchant was saying. Once he caught
+himself hanging an empty kettle over the fire, and nothing he wanted
+was in its usual place.
+
+Kamov could not help noticing Turgen’s distraction. Perhaps the man was
+ill--worried. To live too much alone was bad. The merchant respected
+the Lamut and liked him. He remembered with gratitude how once Turgen
+had cured him of acute stomach pains, and he would return the favor if
+he could. But it is not the habit of northern people to pry. There is a
+right and a wrong time to ask questions.
+
+So the two men ate while they exchanged news of no importance.
+Afterwards they settled back to enjoy their pipes. From behind a cloud
+of smoke Kamov spoke.
+
+“You know, Turgen, you have a considerable sum of money with me.
+Hundreds of roubles. Why don’t you spend some of it?”
+
+“Yes ... Well ... I have everything I need....” Turgen stopped, not
+knowing how to tell the merchant what was in his mind. “However, I have
+been thinking of making quite a large purchase.”
+
+Kamov saw that the conversation was taking an important turn.
+Cautiously feeling his way, he said:
+
+“I mention this because we are living at God’s mercy. If I should
+die, no one would know how much I owe you. For I carry everything in
+my head. You know yourself that most of the hunters are in my debt.
+And your case is special. I should not like to go before God owing
+you so much. It happens that I have brought with me a great deal of
+merchandise. Friend, take as much as you like.”
+
+“Why talk of death?” Turgen answered. “May God grant you many summers
+and winters of life in good health. It is already more than thirty
+winters that I have been dealing with you and I am not complaining.
+Besides, who of us knows whose turn will come first?”
+
+Kamov sighed, “Nor am I complaining. My health and business are very
+good. I won’t hide it from you. I make a fair profit, and without
+cheating. Maybe that is why God has blessed me with a comfortable
+living and a fine family. I am surprised that you go on living alone.
+It must be hard--ay?”
+
+It was this question that Turgen needed to unlock his thoughts. He
+took a long pull at his pipe before he replied: “It is difficult, very
+difficult. But a change is about to take place in my life....”
+
+Carefully he told the merchant all about Marfa and the children, and
+how happy he would be to have a family except that he feared the
+ill-will of the Yakuts in the valley would spoil everything.
+
+“You know yourself,” he concluded, “that I am not a sorcerer. I
+believe in God. I had thought to purchase quite a lot of your wares,
+also to ask where I could get a good horse and cow. Then my household
+would be complete. But what about this feeling about me? What was bad
+before will be doubly bad if I have a family. I want to explain all
+this to Marfa, but I don’t know how. God forbid, she might think me a
+coward and afraid of responsibility. You are a wise man ... what do you
+advise?”
+
+Kamov leisurely emptied the ashes from his pipe, was silent a moment
+and then said:
+
+“You ask for advice? I’ll give it gladly. But this matter isn’t as
+simple as it seems. It needs explaining. Yes, I’ve heard the gossip
+about you--such lies I wonder anyone can believe them. You should have
+spoken to me before. Why didn’t you?”
+
+“I don’t know,” Turgen admitted. “But a man is ashamed to be thought a
+partner of the devil.”
+
+Kamov scratched the back of his head as he considered this.
+
+“It is and it isn’t a matter for laughing. When I was young and a
+hunter, a bear once rumpled me badly. But the wounds healed long ago
+and now I feel no pain at all. Yet human tongues speaking evil can
+inflict wounds no medicines will heal....”
+
+He paused, filled his pipe and lit it. Suddenly a smile broke over his
+face. “My friend, I have found a way out for you! Why didn’t I think of
+it before? It is so very simple.”
+
+Excited, Turgen jumped to his feet. “Then tell me. Help me.”
+
+“Of course ... of course,” Kamov said reassuringly.
+
+He rose, paced back and forth for a minute, and stroked his forehead as
+if gathering his thoughts together.
+
+“Turgen, you know that the Yakuts are like children. It is easy to lead
+them astray with lying words. But no one can doubt that they believe
+in God and fear the devil. No one. They are all Christians even though
+many of them still run to the shamanists. It was the shamanist who did
+you the greatest harm--because he was jealous of you. The people came
+to you for advice and to be cured and you helped them without charge.
+This took business away from him.”
+
+“Maybe,” Turgen admitted.
+
+“Believe me, it was so,” Kamov said positively. “And for that reason
+the shamanist spread foolish tales about you--how with the devil’s help
+you were able to make friends with the mountain rams. The simple people
+could believe such nonsense because rams are known to hate the scent
+of human beings--so why would they eat the food you brought?... No, the
+Yakuts are stupid no doubt, but not evil. They just believed the first
+thing they heard. Now--”
+
+Kamov paused dramatically.
+
+“My idea is this. The Yakuts are Christians. They believe in God. You
+and Marfa are Christians. That being so, you must be married in the
+Christian manner. You see how simple it is. Once you are joined in
+God’s temple by a priest, who will sprinkle you with holy water and
+give you the Gospel and the Cross to touch, not a soul will dare to say
+that you are a friend of the devil. Believe me, faith and prayer--they
+are the best answer to slander. Do you understand?”
+
+Turgen nodded. “I feel that you speak the truth, Kamov. Tell me, what
+must I do? Go to a priest? That will be about sixty miles, but I can do
+it easily on my skis. What shall I say to him? I have never in my life
+had anything to do with a priest. And this is a delicate subject....
+Teach me, my friend!”
+
+Kamov patted Turgen on the shoulder, pleased to have his advice so
+well received. “Don’t excite yourself. You need do nothing. I will see
+to everything myself. The priest is a friend of mine. You will make
+a donation to the church and pay the trifling expenses--that is all.
+Thank God you are not a poor man.... And now we must set a day for
+the wedding. What would you say to Sunday, two weeks from now? Time is
+needed for preparations, and I want to spread news of the wedding among
+the valley people. Father Peter, as you know, is greatly respected. I
+shall tell the Yakuts, too,” Kamov added with a sly wink, “that I will
+be your best man. Popov can give the bride away. Everyone looks up to
+him, and besides he lives close to the chapel. Do you agree?”
+
+“I agree to everything. Thank you. Thank you,” said Turgen gratefully.
+
+“Well, then, all is settled. Just don’t say anything to Marfa. I will
+see Popov at once, and arrange for a party at his house after the
+wedding. He’s a good man and I do a lot of business with him. He won’t
+refuse. About the cow--we will buy that from Popov. One hand washes the
+other, you know.” Here Kamov winked at Turgen again. “As for the horse,
+that will be my present, as best man, to you. But there is one thing I
+ask of you.”
+
+“Yes, yes,” Turgen interrupted. “Anything.”
+
+“I know that you are not a drinking man, Turgen. Perhaps you do not
+approve of others drinking. But the Yakuts will not think it possible
+to celebrate an occasion as important as a wedding without both prayer
+and vodka. Nothing too gay because you aren’t young any more. Just
+enough to wet their throats and lighten their hearts.”
+
+Turgen smiled. “Why not? I have no objection. I do not drink because
+many years ago I took a little too much of the poison, and when
+returning home I lost my way, fell into a hole and almost froze to
+death. That experience taught me a lesson, and I promised my wife that
+never again would I touch a drop of the stuff. However, it is not for
+me to sit in judgment upon others. Our guests must be free to do as
+they please.”
+
+“Good!” Kamov exclaimed. “That’s a sensible and just way to look at it.”
+
+Kamov remembered at this point that his horses had not been fed or
+watered.
+
+“It’s a pull up the mountain, too,” he explained, “though fortunately
+the snow is not deep. Come help me bring the merchandise indoors where
+you can examine it. If I don’t have everything you want with me, I’ll
+get it from my store and send it direct to Marfa.”
+
+As Turgen selected from Kamov’s stores all the things he wanted for
+Marfa and the children and the new home they would have together there
+was joy in his heart. Thinking of the pleasure his purchases would
+bring, he considered that he was performing one of the most important
+acts of his lifetime. And this feeling of exaltation stayed with him
+long after Kamov had left.
+
+“No, the world is not lacking in kind people,” he reflected. “How good
+it is to open one’s heart to a friend.” Truly it was a miracle that
+the Great Spirit had sent Lad in the night with the promise that all
+would be well. And how comforting to know that he, Turgen, did not bear
+his responsibility alone, but that Someone greater and wiser than he
+commanded his life.
+
+He did his chores that evening as if wings lent lightness to his feet.
+After emptying the nets and snares of game, he rushed to feed his rams.
+“Eh, my darlings, if you could only know how happy I am!” he called.
+But the herd did not show itself.
+
+Then before re-entering his yurta, he stopped by the grave of his wife
+and son. “Long ago you went away from me, but still you are close,” he
+addressed them, and his words were a prayer. “This is the place above
+all places where I find peace. I have come to you often with my grief,
+so now let me come to you with my joy. Give me your blessing, that I am
+to be alone no longer. What have I done to deserve this I do not know,
+but who does know the Great Spirit or the extent of His generosity? May
+His grace be with us all, forever.”
+
+Such a day must be concluded in a fitting manner, so Turgen got out
+his reed and played and played until it seemed the walls of the yurta
+could not contain so much melody. He sang of hope and joy and beauty
+and peace of soul. And finally he slept dreamlessly, hearing still the
+music of his own creation.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 28
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+The next two weeks sped by. There were visits to Marfa and the
+children, plans to be made and discussed. And several times Kamov
+called to report cheerfully that everything he had undertaken to do was
+progressing splendidly.
+
+According to him, the people of the valley were at first completely
+overwhelmed by his news. “Have you heard? Turgen is going to marry the
+poor widow Marfa.” The word spread like fire. What seemed to occasion
+surprise was not that Marfa was marrying a Lamut, but that Turgen was
+taking upon himself the burden of providing for her and the children.
+
+Once that fact was accepted, everyone--men and women--had something
+to say about the wedding. A real wedding, in their own small chapel,
+with a service performed by Father Peter himself. And after the
+ceremony--greatest marvel of all--there was to be a feast in the yurta
+of the Bailiff Popov, with the doors open to rich and poor, young and
+old. The people of the valley boiled with excitement and amazement.
+“Just think of it, Father Peter himself will marry them! What a
+blessing! The Father will travel sixty miles just for that! Such an
+event does not occur every day.”
+
+Gradually, in the eyes of the people, Turgen was becoming a highly
+respected man, and Marfa a fortunate woman to get him for her husband.
+She was younger than he, but that was considered no obstacle so long as
+a man was strong and not bad looking. Moreover, Turgen was well-to-do.
+The woman who got him, said the wives sagely, would not have to work
+hard.
+
+Public opinion was so strongly in Turgen’s favor that when someone
+mentioned carelessly his friendship with the devil, the gossiper was
+hissed into silence. “Keep your mouth shut,” bystanders ordered him.
+“Would the priest have consented to give his blessing if what you say
+were true? No. How is it possible that a sorcerer could cross the
+threshold of a chapel? No and No. People were just talking nonsense.”
+
+Only the shamanist failed to express an opinion. Those who tried to
+seek him out and question him were put off by the woman Stepa who
+announced with authority, “The great shamanist is ill and unable to
+talk.” But she gave it as a fact that he had nothing against the
+marriage.
+
+This was enough to convince the shamanist’s ardent supporters that they
+were free to approve Turgen’s action and attend the wedding. Their
+approval was strengthened daily by rumors of important Yakuts who would
+be among the guests. And outweighing all else was the fact that Kamov
+would be best man. The merchant was held in such excellent regard that
+any project he supported must surely be above suspicion.
+
+“As long as Kamov is his friend, who dares to be Turgen’s enemy?” the
+Yakuts asked of one another. And so the word was passed along and the
+day of the wedding arrived.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 29
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+From early morning a large crowd of men, women, and children gathered
+near the chapel. At the hour set for the ceremony a sigh of approval
+went up as ten sleighs appeared drawn by white horses whose tails and
+manes were braided with multicolored ribbons. Around the animals’ necks
+tinkling bells were hung, and their harnesses were dazzling.
+
+“Not a bishop or a governor would be ashamed of such horses,” said one
+watcher to another.
+
+In the first sleigh, driven by the eminent Popov, rode the priest with
+his psalmist, at sight of whom the men uncovered their heads and the
+women bowed low. Behind the priest rode Turgen with Kamov. Then came
+Marfa with the children and the wife of Popov. And behind them notables
+of the district with their wives.
+
+It was a real procession, grand enough to satisfy the most critical.
+Even nature rejoiced. The sun was out and the snow sparkled under its
+rays.
+
+The priest descending blessed the people, the chapel’s single bell
+boomed out, and the guests crossed themselves as they knelt.
+
+With difficulty everyone crowded into the small chapel, for no one
+wanted to miss this most unusual event. There was a feeling of
+expectation and awe.
+
+Blessing the people again, the priest began to pray:
+
+“Brothers, sisters, let us pray to the Lord God for all our people and
+for the prosperity of our great land.”
+
+It was a brief prayer, and after that the wedding service started.
+
+Turgen felt himself to be in a trance. Never before in his life had
+he been the center of so much attention. The burning candles and the
+singing moved him to wonder: “Is it possible that all this is for me, a
+poor Lamut? What have I done to deserve such grace from God?”
+
+He was in fear of making an awkward movement that would mar the
+service. But the priest lent him support with his kind, understanding
+eyes, and from time to time when the questions were incomprehensible,
+Kamov came to his assistance. Marfa beside him was solemn and composed
+as she whispered what seemed to be a prayer, but when their glances
+met her face lighted with a smile of quiet happiness.
+
+To the children it was all part of an enchanting fairy tale. This was
+what their mother meant when she said that Turgen would become their
+father! It was no more than fitting, of course, that he should be paid
+such honor. For was not Turgen the greatest of storytellers and the
+kindest of men? So thinking, they crossed themselves fervently.
+
+Still in a daze, unable either to think or to pray in such magnificent
+surroundings, Turgen got through the ceremony, made a sign opposite his
+name in a big book, and was taken to the home of the Popovs, where the
+tables groaned under mountains of food. There was frozen and smoked
+fish, steaming hot soup, slabs of venison and other meats, and finally
+delicious cloudberry with frozen cream.
+
+After a few tumblers of vodka, the place was filled with friends who
+slapped him on the back and showered him with good wishes. Fortunately,
+Kamov noted his embarrassment and saved him from the noisiest guests,
+while at the same time he saw to it that the supply of vodka was
+limited. There was enough for gayety--and no more. The presence of the
+priest also was a sobering influence.
+
+It was much later and time for the party to end when Kamov rose and
+called for silence.
+
+“Friends,” he said, “let us wish Turgen, Marfa and the children a
+long and happy life. There is a custom among us to give gifts to the
+newlyweds, and for my part I am giving them a fine horse, with harness
+and sleigh. I hope they will do me the honor to travel to their home in
+it this night.”
+
+He was about to say something more, hesitated and then exclaimed: “Hail
+to the new family!”
+
+The company broke into enthusiastic applause. “Fine, fine! Okse! Okse!”
+It was an excellent speech, everyone agreed. No one could have done
+better.
+
+Not to be outdone by the merchant, Popov now got to his feet: “And I am
+making the new family a present of one of my best milk cows.”
+
+Others, stirred to generosity by the prevailing good will, shouted
+above the hubbub declaring their gifts. Afterwards all trooped out to
+the yard to see Turgen off, on the invitation of Kamov who longed to
+hear the horse and sleigh admired.
+
+After seeing that Marfa and the children were made comfortable for the
+ride, Turgen took his seat and to the accompaniment of gay, friendly
+voices urged the horse into motion. Soon the voices were left behind.
+The forest closed in on either side and there was nothing to be heard
+but the pounding hoofs, the creak of runners, and the cheerful tinkle
+of a bell around the horse’s neck.
+
+Marfa touched Turgen’s arm. “It is like a dream,” she said. “Such kind
+people.”
+
+There were many things Turgen might have said in answer. But why
+remember evil? So he only looked at his wife and smiled.
+
+Aksa, who had been unusually silent, now spoke up: “Turgen--Tim and I
+have decided to call you Father. May we?”
+
+“Indeed you may,” Turgen responded heartily. “And just when did you
+decide this?”
+
+“Oh, as soon as we left the church.”
+
+Turgen nodded. “I see. So that is settled and I suppose,” he added
+slyly, “you have no other problems.”
+
+“Yes, I have,” she retorted. “I want to know what we are going to call
+this horse.”
+
+Turgen deliberated.
+
+“Would Friend be a good name?”
+
+“Yes, very good!” the girl exclaimed.
+
+Tim, impatient with his bold, talkative sister, could hold in no
+longer. “It seems to me we have a great many animals. But to whom will
+the mountain rams belong?”
+
+[Illustration]
+
+Turgen felt a surge of love for the boy. Half-jokingly and
+half-seriously he answered: “Yes, we have the beginning of a fine
+household. But the rams belong to God, and they will always be His. You
+and I can only guard and care for them. You remember you promised.”
+
+Then, his heart so full of happiness that he did not trust his voice
+to express it, he grasped the reins and shouted to the horse: “Come
+Friend. Hurry! We are going home.”
+
+The horse quickened its pace, the children shrieked in pleasure, Marfa
+and Turgen looked at each other and smiled. Not one of them doubted
+that they were rushing full speed toward a new and a good life.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 30
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+Since that day many years have passed. Turgen and Marfa saw the
+children grow up, and as the children grew their own well-being
+increased. Wealth was never theirs, but they had enough for their
+wants, and any visitor was assured of a welcome place by their fire.
+
+The Yakuts, conscious of their guilt before Turgen, did their best
+to make up for their past behavior and show their respect. Even the
+shamanist, now very old, came one day to beg forgiveness. When Turgen
+said to him, “We’ll forget the past. Come and be my guest,” the
+shamanist was so touched that he told everyone “Turgen is one of the
+kindest of men. There is more wisdom in his little finger than in my
+old head.”
+
+So the old injustice was buried.
+
+Gradually others came to settle near Marfa’s yurta, until a large
+settlement sprang up around the lake. As they planned, Turgen and his
+family lived in the valley during the winter and in the mountains
+during the summer. Though a great change had come into his life, he did
+not forget his rams but cared for them as before. When age made him
+feebler, he had a fine assistant in Tim who was young and strong.
+
+Turgen lived to see his Lad the leader of a herd of his own. Then one
+day, not long after Tim was married, he departed quietly for the other
+world where Marfa had already gone.
+
+“Do not forget my poor rams and God will be merciful to you,” were the
+last words he spoke.
+
+Tim and Aksa were faithful to their promise. In time there were four
+herds in the mountains instead of one. And the rams no longer fled
+pell-mell at the sight of human beings. Perhaps, as Turgen believed,
+this was because of Lad and the things he had learned during the period
+of his accident. Whatever the explanation, the rams of this region
+lived in peace and flourished, while the people too knew comfort and
+abundance. Surely the Great Spirit, who saw all, had given His blessing.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+_So it was that I, a visitor by accident to Turgen’s mountain country,
+found proof that my teacher spoke truly when he said: “Everywhere there
+is life and everywhere there are warm human hearts.”_
+
+
+
+
+TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES:
+
+
+  Italicized text is surrounded by underscores: _italics_.
+
+  Perceived typographical errors have been corrected.
+
+  Inconsistencies in hyphenation have been standardized.
+
+  Archaic or variant spelling has been retained.
+
+  New original cover art included with this eBook is granted to the
+    public domain.
+
+  Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S.
+    copyright on this publication was renewed.
+
+
+
+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 77051 ***