The Haunted Igloo (10 page)

Chinook stepped back, his
eyes filled with fear. The man grabbed him by the back of his hood
and dragged him forward. “Chinook, you tell!”

Cordell could take no more.
He held up his hand. “Wait a minute,
Monsieur
! What’s going on here? Who
are you and what do you want?”

The man pushed Chinook, who
almost fell at Cordell’s feet. “Chinook, you tell!” roared the
stranger again. Then he spoke some Inuit words Cordell couldn’t
understand.

Chinook peered from beneath
the hood of his parka, his eyes darting from one man to the other
like a frightened fox. Cordell recognized him as Jean-Paul’s
schoolmate.

“
He doesn’t speak good French,
Monsieur
Ardoin,” said
Chinook in a small voice.

“
Is this man your father?” Cordell
asked Chinook.

Lise came up to them. She started to speak,
then closed her mouth and looked down at the boy.

Chinook glanced shyly at
Jean-Paul’s mother, then turned to Cordell. “He’s my father, yes.”
He looked at his father from the corner of his eye. “His name is
Taguk, and he can’t talk French, just
Inuktitut
.”

“
Ah, yes, I do believe we met once
before.”

Cordell motioned to a
chair, meaning for Taguk to sit. But the man was upset and anxious.
He shook his head, then spoke to his son. Chinook’s face turned
dark red.

Cordell spoke gently to the
frightened boy. “What is it, Chinook? Is it Jean-Paul? You boys
were supposed to bring him home. Where is he?”

Chinook looked from Cordell
to Lise and hesitated as he tried to find words for what needed
saying. And that’s when Cordell lost patience and became very
angry.

“
Well, I’m waiting! Do you or do you
not know where our son is?”

“
We didn’t mean any harm,
Monsieur
Ardoin!” Chinook
sputtered.

“
Where’s Jean-Paul?”
thundered Cordell.

“
I don’t know! I don’t know!” cried
Chinook. His dark eyes filled with fear and concern.
“Please,
Monsieur
Ardoin, we have to look for Jean-Paul! We didn’t mean to lose
him!”

Cordell grabbed Chinook by
the shoulders. “
Lose
him? What are you talking about? Where did you leave
Jean-Paul?”

“
At the old
apudyak
. We left him in there, a big
joke. He wanted to join the Ice Patrol—”

Cordell dropped his hands
from Chinook’s shoulders and stared at him. “Yes, yes, we know he
wanted to join the club, but—” He glanced at Lise. She was like a
stone, staring blankly at the boy. “Go on, Chinook, tell us what
happened.” Cordell took his wife’s hand in his.

“
He was inside the
apudyak
.” The boy’s voice shook.
Several times he forgot and spoke in his native language. His eyes
moved from one adult to another. “We left him in there for two
hours. We were going to let him out, but—”

Cordell’s voice fell to a
whisper. “You left him in the igloo? What igloo?”

“
Yes,
Monsieur
. The big one.”

“
You can’t be talking about the
haunted igloo!”

Chinook nodded. “But you
see,
Monsieur
Ardoin, it’s not really haunted!”

Cordell groaned. “You know
that and I know that. But I believe Jean-Paul thought it
was
.” He sighed. “Now we
know where he is. He’s just waiting for the storm to stop so he can
come home.” Cordell gave Lise a hug. “That means he’s safe,
honey.”

Chinook shook his head.
“But he isn’t! He wasn’t there when we got back! And he couldn’t
get out because—” Chinook, brave as he always appeared to be, began
crying. “My father made me come here! I looked for Jean-Paul! All
of us looked for him,
Monsieur
Ardoin. Nanuk and Aiverk, too, even when they
wanted to go home. But the storm was bad. We couldn’t find
Jean-Paul anywhere!” Taguk spoke sharply to Chinook. “My father
says we are wasting time. He says we have to go look for Jean-Paul
right now before he freezes to death.”

“
Dear God,” murmured
Cordell.

Lise drew in a sharp
breath. Cordell’s heart seemed to stop pumping. He said to Lise,
“I’m going with them!” He turned to Chinook. “If anything happens
to my son—!” He made a threatening move toward the boy, but Lise
stopped him.

“
No, Cordell! He’s just a frightened
boy!”

“
Well, so am I!” yelled Cordell. He
tried to remain calm as he faced Chinook again, but his voice
quivered. “I’ll get my team ready.” He pulled his hood up and
fastened it.

Lise stood quietly by, too
upset to speak, tears running down her cheeks. Cordell raised her
chin gently until he could see into her eyes. “Will you be all
right?” Lise nodded. He kissed her cheek and opened the door for
the others. Taguk stopped him, barking strange words and waving his
hands in the air. Cordell turned to Chinook. “What did he
say?”

“
Taguk says we’ll take our team!”
Chinook wiped away his tears. “He says our dogs are faster. They
know how to get around in this storm. We’ll take our team,
Monsieur
Ardoin,
please?”

Cordell clamped a large
hand over the boy’s shoulder. “Please tell Taguk I said thanks.”
Then he remembered the word for “thank you.” He turned to
Taguk.
“
Nakomik
!
Nakomik
!”

Chapter 6

J
ean-Paul was so cold he couldn’t cry. To another human he
would have looked like a small, staggering snowman. Each time he
fell, he was only a lump in the deep snow. Once, after struggling
to his feet, he moved forward only to sink almost out of sight in a
drift.

Sasha called to him over
the roar of the wind:
Hurry! Hurry,
Jean-Paul! Hurry! We have to get home!
In
Jean-Paul’s confused mind, he could almost hear words from an
animal who could not speak. He couldn’t see Sasha anymore, nor
could he see much of anything at all. His eyes were crusted shut
with thick blotches of sticky snow that had blown in around his
hood. His nostrils were dry and swollen, his lips caked with blood
where he had bitten them when he had fallen. His fur-lined mittens
were wet, cold, and useless, for each time he fell, snow went
inside. Stiff and hard and painful, his fingers were small icicles.
He fell often, for the snow was much too deep for
walking.

“
Ma ... Ma . . .” Jean-Paul’s voice
was weak, the words barely out of his mouth before the wind and
blowing snow carried them away. He sank helplessly to his knees. He
heard Sasha whine and felt her cold nose as it nudged his cheek.
With his remaining strength, he pulled the pup’s shaggy body
against his hurting face. He was tired and weak, and his body felt
numb as he lay down in the snow.

____________

T
he wind grew calmer, but heavy snow continued to fall,
creating a silent, deathly wilderness. From a distance shone a
small yellow light, moving first to the left, then to the right.
Closer and closer it came, and with it came the sounds of a howling
dog team.

Sasha sat up from her watch over Jean-Paul.
Up went her furry, black-tipped ears, turning in the direction of
the furious yapping and yelping of the strange huskies. She knew it
was not Tork, nor any other dogs from home. She rose on all fours
and watched, her muscles rippling with excitement beneath her fur.
She wagged her tail, then she whined. But she dared not leave
Jean-Paul alone. Whoever was out there in the darkness would have
to come to them.

The light veered off in another direction,
the barking and howling grew fainter. Sasha danced and jumped
around in the snow, howling loudly.

The other team heard, and
answered. The lantern light turned back in the right direction,
growing bigger and brighter as the team and sled came plowing
in.

Cordell and Chinook came on
snowshoes before the sled, lifting their feet straight up out of
the soft snow and stamping it down so the dogs could run. Cordell,
swinging the lamp, caught sight of Sasha first. She bounded up to
him and nearly knocked him down. He ruffled her long neck hair.
“Where’s Jean-Paul?” he cried, trying to catch his breath. He was
worn out, his legs weak and heavy from tromping. “Take me to
Jean-Paul, Sasha!”

Sasha’s reply was a mixture
of woof and howl, and with Cordell close behind, she led him to the
snow-covered lump that was Jean-Paul.

“
Oh! Dear God!” Cordell gasped,
dropping the lantern. He knelt in the snow to scoop up his son. He
staggered to his feet under the load and the clumsiness of the big
snowshoes. Chinook came up behind.

“
Is it Jean-Paul?” Chinook picked up
the lantern and held it to Jean-Paul’s face, which looked yellow in
the lamplight. “Oh, no. Is he—is he
dead
?”

Cordell struggled for
breath. His lungs hurt to breathe. “He’s very ... cold ... needs
help fast ... hope we’re not too late.” He heard a sharp cry from
Chinook.

Chinook hurried alongside
Cordell. “He’s so little,
Monsieur
Ardoin! A small
okalerk
.”

“
A small
boy
, Chinook!”

“
Yes, sure,
Monsieur
. That’s what I
meant.”

Taguk and his team pulled
up. The noise of strange dogs filled the night, Taguk’s harsh Inuit
dialect rising above the din. Sasha ignored them and pranced by
Cordell’s side as he carried Jean-Paul to the waiting
sled.

Taguk spoke sharply to the
team, and they became still. Chinook pulled back a thick bearskin
robe and Cordell laid Jean-Paul on it, rolling him up like a
sausage, with only his nose poking out. Sasha jumped onto the sled
and lay next to Jean-Paul, daring anyone to prevent a husky from
hitching a ride on a dogsled.

“
Tell your father we’re ready,”
Cordell told Chinook. “And tell him to hurry!”

____________

C
ordell and Lise sat beside Jean-Paul’s bed for the rest of the
night. Jean-Paul was exhausted and slept fitfully, sometimes crying
out in his sleep. Lise roused him from time to time to spoon warm
meat broth and tea between his swollen, bruised lips. His eyes
seemed sunken in his small face, but the warmth of the soup brought
color back to his cheeks.

Now Sasha lay at the foot
of the bed, her sad blue eyes riveted on Jean-Paul. She had not
even tasted the hearty meal Cordell had set before her.

Lise spoke softly to her
husband, “That pup saved our boy’s life. She didn’t leave him alone
in the storm.”

Cordell agreed. He reached
down and scratched the dog’s ear. “You’re one in a million, aren’t
you, girl?” Sasha whined and crept closer to Jean-Paul, laying her
muzzle on his leg.

Lise was thoughtful for a
long time. Then, “It was a terrible thing those boys did. They’ll
probably be punished for this.”

Cordell sighed. He was
still very tired from his long trek in the snow and cold. “Well,
I’m sure Chinook’s already punished himself, in his mind. Imagine
the guilt he would have carried the rest of his life if Jean-Paul
had . . .” He could not make himself say the word.

Lise smoothed Jean-Paul’s
covers and lay a warm hand against his cheek. She was satisfied
that he was thawing out nicely. His skin grew warmer by the
minute.

“
Jean-Paul did
not
die,” she said quietly. “He
will
not die, thank
God.”

Jean-Paul’s eyelids
fluttered at the sound of his name. He opened his eyes at his
mother’s gentle touch. His eyes moved from Lise to his father.
Sasha raised her head and spoke. He brought his hand from beneath
the blankets and laid it on her head. He didn’t speak, but his eyes
filled with tears.

“
What is it, darling?” Lise asked,
leaning over him. “Are you in pain?”

Jean-Paul shook his head.
“No.” Still, he didn’t speak.

Cordell’s eyes were shiny
and wet. He swallowed a lump in his throat and touched the boy
gently on the top of his head. “You’re going to be just fine, son.
You were dressed warmly. And there’s just a small bit of frostbite
on your face and hands. That will heal. I suspect Sasha lay down in
the snow with you to keep you warm. It’s a fine dog you’ve got
yourself.”

Jean-Paul’s eyes brightened
for a moment and he looked at his mother again.

“
What is it, dear? Why don’t you talk
to us?” Lise looked at her husband. “What’s wrong with him,
Cordell?”

Cordell wiped his eyes with
the back of his hand and smiled at Lise. “Nothing’s wrong. He’ll
talk when he’s ready.” He looked fondly down at Jean-Paul. “Your
friend Chinook told us what happened. When the boys went back for
you, you were already gone. Chinook and his father helped search
for you. That shows how worried Chinook was.”