 | "The Alien" |  |
6. VI
AT last, with slow and faltering step, he returned to his lair. He threw himself down upon the floor of the cave and cursed the world — cursed everything in it, individually and generally; and then he cursed Susette.
"It's some other wolf," he hissed; "some other gray dog she's goin' to see! Oh, darn him! Darn his gray hide! I'll kill her, if she ever gits back!"
He took out his knife and began whetting it viciously upon his boot.
"I'll cut her into strips and eat 'em! Wasn't I good to her? Couldn't I have killed her? Oh, I'll cut her into strips, I will!"
He whetted his knife for an hour, cursing through his teeth. At last his anger grew into a foolish madness. He hurled himself upon the bunch of furs beside him and made himself imagine that they were Susette. He set his teeth into them; he crushed them with his hands. Then, in the impotence of his anger, he fell upon his face and sobbed himself to sleep.
Strange visions passed before him. Again he killed Lecroix, and saw the dead face grinning at the stars. Again he sat in his mother's lodge and wept because he was a stranger. Again he was fleeing, fleeing, fleeing from a leather noose that hung above him like a black cloud, and circled and lowered and raised and lowered, until it swooped down upon him and closed about his neck.
With a yell of fright he awoke from his nightmare. His head throbbed, his mouth was parched.
At last day came in sneakingly through the opening — a dull, melancholy light and with it came Susette, sniffing, with the bristles of her neck erect.
"Susette! Susette!" cried the man joyfully.
He no longer thought of killing her. He seized her in his arms; he kissed her frost-whitened muzzle.
She received his caresses with disdain; whereat he redoubled his acts of fondness. He fed her and petted her as she ate; then the bristles on her neck dropped. She nosed him half fondly. And Antoine, manlike, was glad again. He contented himself with touching the frayed hem of the garment of Happiness.
He ate nothing that day. He said to himself: "I won't hunt till it's all gone; she can have it all." He was afraid to leave Susette; he was afraid to take her with him again into the land of her people. Antoine was jealous.
All day he was kind to her with pitiful kindness. He whispered softly into her ear:
"Susette, I hain't a goin' to be jealous no more. You've been a bad girl, Susette; don't do it again. I won't be mean, less'n you let him come skulkin' around here."
The next morning Antoine did not get up. He felt sore and exhausted. By evening his heart was beating like a
"Susette," he called, "I ain't feelin' right. Come here and let me touch you again."
| "The Alien" | |