Джек Лондон - Белый клык / White Fang

White Fang became hated by man and dog. During this period of his development he never knew a moment’s security. The tooth of every dog was against him, the hand of every man. As for snarling, he could snarl more terribly than any dog, young or old.

He was an outcast from the pack of the dogs. But it was he who made them fear, and not on the contrary. They kept together, as they were afraid.

But the pack invariably lost him. Its noise warned him of its presence, while he ran alone, velvet-footed, silently, a moving shadow among the trees after the manner of his father and mother before him. He was more directly connected with the Wild than they; and he knew more of its secrets. His favourite trick was to lose his trail in running water and then lie quietly in a near-by bush while their cries sounded around him.

Hated by his kind and by mankind, in a state of endless war, his development was rapid and one-sided. There was no place for kindliness and affection. The code he learned was to obey the strong and to oppress the weak. Grey Beaver was a god, and strong. Therefore White Fang obeyed him. But the dog younger or smaller than himself was weak, a thing to be destroyed. His development was in the direction of power. He became quicker of movement than the other dogs, smarter, deadlier, crueller, leaner, with iron muscles, more enduring, and more intelligent. He had to become all these things, or he would not survive.

In autumn White Fang got his chance for liberty. The tribe was preparing to go off to the autumn hunting. White Fang watched it all with eager eyes, and when the tepees began to come down and the canoes were loading at the bank, he understood. Already the canoes were departing, and some had disappeared down the river.

Quite deliberately he decided to stay behind. He waited his opportunity to ran out of camp to the woods. He crawled into the heart of a dense bush and waited. The time passed by, and he slept for hours. Then he was woken by Grey Beaver’s voice calling him by name. There were other voices. White Fang could hear Grey Beaver’s squaw taking part in the search, and Mit-sah, who was Grey Beaver’s son.

White Fang trembled with fear. He resisted the impulse to crawl out of his hiding-place. After a time the voices died away. For a while he played about among the trees, pleasuring in his freedom. Then, and quite suddenly, he felt lonely. And then it was cold. Here was no warm side of a tepee. He curved his bushy tail around to cover his legs, and at the same time he saw a vision. There was nothing strange about it. He saw the camp again, the tepees, and the blaze of the fires. He heard the voices of the women, the basses of the men, and the snarling of the dogs. He was hungry, and he remembered pieces of meat and fish that had been thrown to him. Here was no meat, nothing but scary silence.

His bondage had softened him, irresponsibility had weakened him. The night yawned about him. There was nothing to do, nothing to see or to hear.

He tried to stand it, but could not. Finally a shadow of a tree, then a loud noise of branches frightened him. A panic seized him, and he ran madly toward the village. He knew an overpowering desire for the protection and companionship of man. In his nostrils was the smell of the camp-smoke. In his ears the camp-sounds and cries were ringing loud. But no village met his eyes. He had forgotten. The village had gone away.

There was no place to which to flee. He would have been glad if somebody threw a stone in him or kicked him or shouted at him angrily. But there was nobody even for that.

He came to where Grey Beaver’s tepee had stood. In the centre of the space it had occupied, he sat down. He pointed his nose at the moon. His throat was afflicted by spasms, his mouth opened, and in a heart-broken cry went up his loneliness and fear, his grief for Kiche, all his past sorrows as well as his apprehension of sufferings and dangers in future. It was a long, mournful wolf-howl, the first howl he had ever uttered.

The coming of daylight broke his fears but increased his loneliness. It did not take him long to make up his mind.

All day he ran. He did not rest. He seemed made to run on for ever. His iron-like body ignored tiredness.

White Fang was intelligent beyond the average of his kind; yet his mental vision was not wide enough to embrace the other bank of the Mackenzie. What if the trail of the gods led out on that side? It never entered his head. He was too young for such conclusions.

By the middle of the second day he had been running continuously for thirty hours. It was the endurance of his mind that kept him going. He had not eaten in forty hours, and he was weak with hunger. His handsome coat was in bad condition. The broad pads of his feet were bleeding. He had begun to limp. To make it worse, snow began to fall.

Grey Beaver had intended camping that night on the far bank of the Mackenzie, for it was in that direction that the hunting lay. But on the near bank, shortly before dark, Kloo-kooch (who was Grey Beaver’s squaw) saw a moose. They killed it. Otherwise Grey Beaver would not have camped on the near side of the Mackenzie, and White Fang would have passed by and gone on, either to die or to find his way to his wild brothers and become one of them – a wolf to the end of his days.

Night had fallen. The snow was flying more thickly. White Fang, whimpering softly to himself as he stumbled and limped along, came upon a fresh trail in the snow. He recognized it immediately. Whining with eagerness, he followed back from the river bank and in among the trees. The camp-sounds came to his ears. He saw the blaze of the fire, Kloo-kooch cooking, and Grey Beaver with a piece of raw meat. There was fresh meat in camp!

White Fang expected a beating. He crouched and bristled a little at the thought of it. Then he went forward again. He knew, further, that the comfort of the fire would be his, the protection of the gods, the companionship of the dogs – the last, a companionship of enemies.

He came crawling into the firelight. Grey Beaver saw him. White Fang crawled straight toward him, every inch of his progress becoming slower and more painful. At last he lied at the master’s feet, into whose possession he now surrendered himself, voluntarily, body and soul. Of his own choice, he came to sit by man’s fire and to be ruled by him. White Fang trembled, waiting for the punishment. There was a movement of the hand above him. He waited for the blow to fall. It did not fall. He looked upward. Grey Beaver was breaking the piece of meat in half! Grey Beaver was offering him one piece of it! Very gently and somewhat suspiciously, he first smelled the meat and then ate it. Grey Beaver ordered meat to be brought to him, and guarded him from the other dogs while he ate. After that White Fang lay at Grey Beaver’s feet, gazing at the fire that warmed him, secure in the knowledge that the morning would find him not wandering alone through forest, but in the camp of the man-animals, with the gods to whom he had given himself and upon whom he was now dependent.

In December Grey Beaver went on another journey up the Mackenzie. Mit-sah and Kloo-kooch went with him. One sled he drove himself. A second and smaller sled was driven by Mit-sah, and to this was harnessed a team of puppies, not adult dogs. It was more of a toy affair than anything else, yet it was the delight of Mit-sah, who felt that he was beginning to do a man’s work in the world. Also, he was learning to drive dogs and to train dogs.

White Fang did not protest. About his neck was put a collar, which was connected by two pulling-traces to a strap that passed around his chest and over his back. To this was fastened the long rope by which he pulled at the sled.