第1章 热爱生命

LOVE OF LIFE

This out of all will remain—

They have lived and have tossed:

So much of the game will be gain,

Though the gold of the dice has been lost.

They limped painfully down the bank,and once the foremost of the two men staggered among the rough-strewn rocks.They were tired and weak,and their faces had the drawn expression of patience which comes of hardship long endured.They were heavily burdened with blanket packs which were strapped to their shoulders.Head-straps,passing across the forehead,helped support these packs.Each man carried a rifle.They walked in a stooped posture,the shoulders well forward,the head still farther forward,the eyes bent upon the ground.

“I wish we had just about two of them cartridges that's layin'in that cache of ourn,”said the second man.

His voice was utterly and drearily expressionless.He spoke without enthusiasm;and the first man,limping into the milky stream that foamed over the rocks,vouchsafed no reply.

The other man followed at his heels.They did not remove their foot-gear,though the water was icy cold—so cold that their ankles ached and their feet went numb.In places the water dashed against their knees,and both men staggered for footing.

The man who followed slipped on a smooth boulder,nearly fell,but recovered himself with a violent effort,at the same time uttering a sharp exclamation of pain.He seemed faint and dizzy and put out his free hand while he reeled,as though seeking support against the air.When he had steadied himself he stepped forward,but reeled again and nearly fell.Then he stood still and looked at the other man,who had never turned his head.

The man stood still for fully a minute,as though debating with himself.Then he called out:

“I say,Bill,I've sprained my ankle.”

Bill staggered on through the milky water.He did not look around.The man watched him go,and though his face was expressionless as ever,his eyes were like the eyes of a wounded deer.

The other man limped up the farther bank and continued straight on without looking back.The man in the stream watched him.His lips trembled a little,so that the rough thatch of brown hair which covered them was visibly agitated.His tongue even strayed out to moisten them.

“Bill!”he cried out.It was the pleading cry of a strong man in distress,but Bill's head did not turn.The man watched him go,limping grotesquely and lurching forward with stammering gait up the slow slope toward the soft sky-line of the low-lying hill.He watched him go till he passed over the crest and disappeared.Then he turned his gaze and slowly took in the circle of the world that remained to him now that Bill was gone.

Near the horizon the sun was smouldering dimly,almost obscured by formless mists and vapors,which gave an impression of mass and density without outline or tangibility.The man pulled out his watch,the while resting his weight on one leg.It was four o'clock,and as the season was near the last of July or first of August,—he did not know the precise date within a week or two,—he knew that the sun roughly marked the northwest.He looked to the south and knew that somewhere beyond those bleak hills lay the Great Bear Lake;also,he knew that in that direction the Arctic Circle cut its forbidding way across the Canadian Barrens.This stream in which he stood was a feeder to the Coppermine River,which in turn flowed north and emptied into Coronation Gulf and the Arctic Ocean.He had never been there,but he had seen it,once,on a Hudson Bay Company chart.

Again his gaze completed the circle of the world about him.It was not a heartening spectacle.Everywhere was soft sky-line.The hills were all low-lying.There were no trees,no shrubs,no grasses—naught but a tremendous and terrible desolation that sent fear swiftly dawning into his eyes.

“Bill!”he whispered,once and twice;“Bill!”

He cowered in the midst of the milky water,as though the vastness were pressing in upon him with overwhelming force,brutally crushing him with its complacent awfulness.He began to shake as with an ague-fit,till the gun fell from his hand with a splash.This served to rouse him.He fought with his fear and pulled himself together,groping in the water and recovering the weapon.He hitched his pack farther over on his left shoulder,so as to take a portion of its weight from off the injured ankle.Then he proceeded,slowly and carefully,wincing with pain,to the bank.

He did not stop.With a desperation that was madness,unmindful of the pain,he hurried up the slope to the crest of the hill over which his comrade had disappeared—more grotesque and comical by far than that limping,jerking comrade.But at the crest he saw a shallow valley,empty of life.He fought with his fear again,overcame it,hitched the pack still farther over on his left shoulder,and lurched on down the slope.

The bottom of the valley was soggy with water,which the thick moss held,spongelike,close to the surface.This water squirted out from under his feet at every step,and each time he lifted a foot the action culminated in a sucking sound as the wet moss reluctantly released its grip.He picked his way from muskeg to muskeg,and followed the other man's footsteps along and across the rocky ledges which thrust like islets through the sea of moss.

Though alone,he was not lost.Farther on he knew he would come to where dead spruce and fir,very small and weazened,bordered the shore of a little lake,the titchin-nichilie,in the tongue of the country,the “land of little sticks.”And into that lake flowed a small stream,the water of which was not milky.There was rush-grass on that stream—this he remembered well—but no timber,and he would follow it till its first trickle ceased at a divide.He would cross this divide to the first trickle of another stream,flowing to the west,which he would follow until it emptied into the river Dease,and here he would find a cache under an upturned canoe and piled over with many rocks.And in this cache would be ammunition for his empty gun,fish-hooks and lines,a small net—all the utilities for the killing and snaring of food.Also,he would find flour,—not much,—a piece of bacon,and some beans.

Bill would be waiting for him there,and they would paddle away south down the Dease to the Great Bear Lake.And south across the lake they would go,ever south,till they gained the Mackenzie.And south,still south,they would go,while the winter raced vainly after them,and the ice formed in the eddies,and the days grew chill and crisp,south to some warm Hudson Bay Company post,where timber grew tall and generous and there was grub without end.

These were the thoughts of the man as he strove onward.But hard as he strove with his body,he strove equally hard with his mind,trying to think that Bill had not deserted him,that Bill would surely wait for him at the cache.He was compelled to think this thought,or else there would not be any use to strive,and he would have lain down and died.And as the dim ball of the sun sank slowly into the northwest he covered every inch—and many times—of his and Bill's flight south before the downcoming winter.And he conned the grub of the cache and the grub of the Hudson Bay Company post over and over again.He had not eaten for two days;for a far longer time he had not had all he wanted to eat.Often he stooped and picked pale muskeg berries,put them into his mouth,and chewed and swallowed them.A muskeg berry is a bit of seed enclosed in a bit of water.In the mouth the water melts away and the seed chews sharp and bitter.The man knew there was no nourishment in the berries,but he chewed them patiently with a hope greater than knowledge and defying experience.

At nine o'clock he stubbed his toe on a rocky ledge,and from sheer weariness and weakness staggered and fell.He lay for some time,without movement,on his side.Then he slipped out of the pack-straps and clumsily dragged himself into a sitting posture.It was not yet dark,and in the lingering twilight he groped about among the rocks for shreds of dry moss.When he had gathered a heap he built a fire,—a smouldering,smudgy fire,—and put a tin pot of water on to boil.

He unwrapped his pack and the first thing he did was to count his matches.There were sixty-seven.He counted them three times to make sure.He divided them into several portions,wrapping them in oil paper,disposing of one bunch in his empty tobacco pouch,of another bunch in the inside band of his battered hat,of a third bunch under his shirt on the chest.This accomplished,a panic came upon him,and he unwrapped them all and counted them again.There were still sixty-seven.

He dried his wet foot-gear by the fire.The moccasins were in soggy shreds.The blanket socks were worn through in places,and his feet were raw and bleeding.His ankle was throbbing,and he gave it an examination.It had swollen to the size of his knee.He tore a long strip from one of his two blankets and bound the ankle tightly.He tore other strips and bound them about his feet to serve for both moccasins and socks.Then he drank the pot of water,steaming hot,wound his watch,and crawled between his blankets.

He slept like a dead man.The brief darkness around midnight came and went.The sun arose in the northeast—at least the day dawned in that quarter,for the sun was hidden by gray clouds.

At six o'clock he awoke,quietly lying on his back.He gazed straight up into the gray sky and knew that he was hungry.As he rolled over on his elbow he was startled by a loud snort,and saw a bull caribou regarding him with alert curiosity.The animal was not more than fifty feet away,and instantly into the man's mind leaped the vision and the savor of a caribou steak sizzling and frying over a fire.Mechanically he reached for the empty gun,drew a bead,and pulled the trigger.The bull snorted and leaped away,his hoofs rattling and clattering as he fled across the ledges.

The man cursed and flung the empty gun from him.He groaned aloud as he started to drag himself to his feet.It was a slow and arduous task.His joints were like rusty hinges.They worked harshly in their sockets,with much friction,and each bending or unbending was accomplished only through a sheer exertion of will.When he finally gained his feet,another minute or so was consumed in straightening up,so that he could stand erect as a man should stand.

He crawled up a small knoll and surveyed the prospect.There were no trees,no bushes,nothing but a gray sea of moss scarcely diversified by gray rocks,gray lakelets,and gray streamlets.The sky was gray.There was no sun nor hint of sun.He had no idea of north,and he had forgotten the way he had come to this spot the night before.But he was not lost.He knew that.Soon he would come to the land of the little sticks.He felt that it lay off to the left somewhere,not far—possibly just over the next low hill.

He went back to put his pack into shape for travelling.He assured himself of the existence of his three separate parcels of matches,though he did not stop to count them.But he did linger,debating,over a squat moose-hide sack.It was not large.He could hide it under his two hands.He knew that it weighed fifteen pounds,—as much as all the rest of the pack,—and it worried him.He finally set it to one side and proceeded to roll the pack.He paused to gaze at the squat moose-hide sack.He picked it up hastily with a defiant glance about him,as though the desolation were trying to rob him of it;and when he rose to his feet to stagger on into the day,it was included in the pack on his back.

He bore away to the left,stopping now and again to eat muskeg berries.His ankle had stiffened,his limp was more pronounced,but the pain of it was as nothing compared with the pain of his stomach.The hunger pangs were sharp.They gnawed and gnawed until he could not keep his mind steady on the course he must pursue to gain the land of little sticks.The muskeg berries did not allay this gnawing,while they made his tongue and the roof of his mouth sore with their irritating bite.

He came upon a valley where rock ptarmigan rose on whirring wings from the ledges and muskegs.Ker—ker—ker was the cry they made.He threw stones at them,but could not hit them.He placed his pack on the ground and stalked them as a cat stalks a sparrow.The sharp rocks cut through his pants'legs till his knees left a trail of blood;but the hurt was lost in the hurt of his hunger.He squirmed over the wet moss,saturating his clothes and chilling his body;but he was not aware of it,so great was his fever for food.And always the ptarmigan rose,whirring,before him,till their ker—ker—ker became a mock to him,and he cursed them and cried aloud at them with their own cry.

Once he crawled upon one that must have been asleep.He did not see it till it shot up in his face from its rocky nook.He made a clutch as startled as was the rise of the ptarmigan,and there remained in his hand three tail-feathers.As he watched its flight he hated it,as though it had done him some terrible wrong.Then he returned and shouldered his pack.

As the day wore along he came into valleys or swales where game was more plentiful.A band of caribou passed by,twenty and odd animals,tantalizingly within rifle range.He felt a wild desire to run after them,a certitude that he could run them down.A black fox came toward him,carrying a ptarmigan in his mouth.The man shouted.It was a fearful cry,but the fox,leaping away in fright,did not drop the ptarmigan.

Late in the afternoon he followed a stream,milky with lime,which ran through sparse patches of rush-grass.Grasping these rushes firmly near the root,he pulled up what resembled a young onion-sprout no larger than a shingle-nail.It was tender,and his teeth sank into it with a crunch that promised deliciously of food.But its fibers were tough.It was composed of stringy filaments saturated with water,like the berries,and devoid of nourishment.He threw off his pack and went into the rush-grass on hands and knees,crunching and munching,like some bovine creature.

He was very weary and often wished to rest—to lie down and sleep;but he was continually driven on—not so much by his desire to gain the land of little sticks as by his hunger.He searched little ponds for frogs and dug up the earth with his nails for worms,though he knew in spite that neither frogs nor worms existed so far north.

He looked into every pool of water vainly,until,as the long twilight came on,he discovered a solitary fish,the size of a minnow,in such a pool.He plunged his arm in up to the shoulder,but it eluded him.He reached for it with both hands and stirred up the milky mud at the bottom.In his excitement he fell in,wetting himself to the waist.Then the water was too muddy to admit of his seeing the fish,and he was compelled to wait until the sediment had settled.

The pursuit was renewed,till the water was again muddied.But he could not wait.He unstrapped the tin bucket and began to bale the pool.He baled wildly at first,splashing himself and flinging the water so short a distance that it ran back into the pool.He worked more carefully,striving to be cool,though his heart was pounding against his chest and his hands were trembling.At the end of half an hour the pool was nearly dry.Not a cupful of water remained.And there was no fish.He found a hidden crevice among the stones through which it had escaped to the adjoining and larger pool—a pool which he could not empty in a night and a day.Had he known of the crevice,he could have closed it with a rock at the beginning and the fish would have been his.

Thus he thought,and crumpled up and sank down upon the wet earth.At first he cried softly to himself,then he cried loudly to the pitiless desolation that ringed him around;and for a long time after he was shaken by great dry sobs.

He built a fire and warmed himself by drinking quarts of hot water,and made camp on a rocky ledge in the same fashion he had the night before.The last thing he did was to see that his matches were dry and to wind his watch.The blankets were wet and clammy.His ankle pulsed with pain.But he knew only that he was hungry,and through his restless sleep he dreamed of feasts and banquets and of food served and spread in all imaginable ways.

He awoke chilled and sick.There was no sun.The gray of earth and sky had become deeper,more profound.A raw wind was blowing,and the first flurries of snow were whitening the hilltops.The air about him thickened and grew white while he made a fire and boiled more water.It was wet snow,half rain,and the flakes were large and soggy.At first they melted as soon as they came in contact with the earth,but ever more fell,covering the ground,putting out the fire,spoiling his supply of moss-fuel.

This was a signal for him to strap on his pack and stumble onward,he knew not where.He was not concerned with the land of little sticks,nor with Bill and the cache under the upturned canoe by the river Dease.He was mastered by the verb “to eat.”He was hunger-mad.He took no heed of the course he pursued,so long as that course led him through the swale bottoms.He felt his way through the wet snow to the watery muskeg berries,and went by feel as he pulled up the rush-grass by the roots.But it was tasteless stuff and did not satisfy.He found a weed that tasted sour and he ate all he could find of it,which was not much,for it was a creeping growth,easily hidden under the several inches of snow.

He had no fire that night,nor hot water,and crawled under his blanket to sleep the broken hunger-sleep.The snow turned into a cold rain.He awakened many times to feel it falling on his upturned face.Day came—a gray day and no sun.It had ceased raining.The keenness of his hunger had departed.Sensibility,as far as concerned the yearning for food,had been exhausted.There was a dull,heavy ache in his stomach,but it did not bother him so much.He was more rational,and once more he was chiefly interested in the land of little sticks and the cache by the river Dease.

He ripped the remnant of one of his blankets into strips and bound his bleeding feet.Also,he recinched the injured ankle and prepared himself for a day of travel.When he came to his pack,he paused long over the squat moose-hide sack,but in the end it went with him.

The snow had melted under the rain,and only the hilltops showed white.The sun came out,and he succeeded in locating the points of the compass,though he knew now that he was lost.Perhaps,in his previous days'wanderings,he had edged away too far to the left.He now bore off to the right to counteract the possible deviation from his true course.

Though the hunger pangs were no longer so exquisite,he realized that he was weak.He was compelled to pause for frequent rests,when he attacked the muskeg berries and rush-grass patches.His tongue felt dry and large,as though covered with a fine hairy growth,and it tasted bitter in his mouth.His heart gave him a great deal of trouble.When he had travelled a few minutes it would begin a remorseless thump,thump,thump,and then leap up and away in a painful flutter of beats that choked him and made him go faint and dizzy.

In the middle of the day he found two minnows in a large pool.It was impossible to bale it,but he was calmer now and managed to catch them in his tin bucket.They were no longer than his little finger,but he was not particularly hungry.The dull ache in his stomach had been growing duller and fainter.It seemed almost that his stomach was dozing.He ate the fish raw,masticating with painstaking care,for the eating was an act of pure reason.While he had no desire to eat,he knew that he must eat to live.

In the evening he caught three more minnows,eating two and saving the third for breakfast.The sun had dried stray shreds of moss,and he was able to warm himself with hot water.He had not covered more than ten miles that day;and the next day,travelling whenever his heart permitted him,he covered no more than five miles.But his stomach did not give him the slightest uneasiness.It had gone to sleep.He was in a strange country,too,and the caribou were growing more plentiful,also the wolves.Often their yelps drifted across the desolation,and once he saw three of them slinking away before his path.

Another night;and in the morning,being more rational,he untied the leather string that fastened the squat moose-hide sack.From its open mouth poured a yellow stream of coarse gold-dust and nuggets.He roughly divided the gold in halves,caching one half on a prominent ledge,wrapped in a piece of blanket,and returning the other half to the sack.He also began to use strips of the one remaining blanket for his feet.He still clung to his gun,for there were cartridges in that cache by the river Dease.This was a day of fog,and this day hunger awoke in him again.He was very weak and was afflicted with a giddiness which at times blinded him.It was no uncommon thing now for him to stumble and fall;and stumbling once,he fell squarely into a ptarmigan nest.There were four newly hatched chicks,a day old—little specks of pulsating life no more than a mouthful;and he ate them ravenously,thrusting them alive into his mouth and crunching them like egg-shells between his teeth.The mother ptarmigan beat about him with great outcry.He used his gun as a club with which to knock her over,but she dodged out of reach.He threw stones at her and with one chance shot broke a wing.Then she fluttered away,running,trailing the broken wing,with him in pursuit.

The little chicks had no more than whetted his appetite.He hopped and bobbed clumsily along on his injured ankle,throwing stones and screaming hoarsely at times;at other times hopping and bobbing silently along,picking himself up grimly and patiently when he fell,or rubbing his eyes with his hand when the giddiness threatened to overpower him.

The chase led him across swampy ground in the bottom of the valley,and he came upon footprints in the soggy moss.They were not his own—he could see that.They must be Bill's.But he could not stop,for the mother ptarmigan was running on.He would catch her first,then he would return and investigate.

He exhausted the mother ptarmigan;but he exhausted himself.She lay panting on her side.He lay panting on his side,a dozen feet away,unable to crawl to her.And as he recovered she recovered,fluttering out of reach as his hungry hand went out to her.The chase was resumed.Night settled down and she escaped.He stumbled from weakness and pitched head foremost on his face,cutting his cheek,his pack upon his back.He did not move for a long while;then he rolled over on his side,wound his watch,and lay there until morning.

Another day of fog.Half of his last blanket had gone into foot-wrappings.He failed to pick up Bill's trail.It did not matter.His hunger was driving him too compellingly—only—only he wondered if Bill,too,were lost.By midday the irk of his pack became too oppressive.Again he divided the gold,this time merely spilling half of it on the ground.In the afternoon he threw the rest of it away,there remaining to him only the half-blanket,the tin bucket,and the rifle.

An hallucination began to trouble him.He felt confident that one cartridge remained to him.It was in the chamber of the rifle and he had overlooked it.On the other hand,he knew all the time that the chamber was empty.But the hallucination persisted.He fought it off for hours,then threw his rifle open and was confronted with emptiness.The disappointment was as bitter as though he had really expected to find the cartridge.

He plodded on for half an hour,when the hallucination arose again.Again he fought it,and still it persisted,till for very relief he opened his rifle to unconvince himself.At times his mind wandered farther afield,and he plodded on,a mere automaton,strange conceits and whimsicalities gnawing at his brain like worms.But these excursions out of the real were of brief duration,for ever the pangs of the hunger-bite called him back.He was jerked back abruptly once from such an excursion by a sight that caused him nearly to faint.He reeled and swayed,doddering like a drunken man to keep from falling.Before him stood a horse.A horse!He could not believe his eyes.A thick mist was in them,intershot with sparkling points of light.He rubbed his eyes savagely to clear his vision,and beheld,not a horse,but a great brown bear.The animal was studying him with bellicose curiosity.

The man had brought his gun halfway to his shoulder before he realized.He lowered it and drew his hunting-knife from its beaded sheath at his hip.Before him was meat and life.He ran his thumb along the edge of his knife.It was sharp.The point was sharp.He would fling himself upon the bear and kill it.But his heart began its warning thump,thump,thump.Then followed the wild upward leap and tattoo of flutters,the pressing as of an iron band about his forehead,the creeping of the dizziness into his brain.

His desperate courage was evicted by a great surge of fear.In his weakness,what if the animal attacked him?He drew himself up to his most imposing stature,gripping the knife and staring hard at the bear.The bear advanced clumsily a couple of steps,reared up,and gave vent to a tentative growl.If the man ran,he would run after him;but the man did not run.He was animated now with the courage of fear.He,too,growled,savagely,terribly,voicing the fear that is to life germane and that lies twisted about life's deepest roots.

The bear edged away to one side,growling menacingly,himself appalled by this mysterious creature that appeared upright and unafraid.But the man did not move.He stood like a statue till the danger was past,when he yielded to a fit of trembling and sank down into the wet moss.

He pulled himself together and went on,afraid now in a new way.It was not the fear that he should die passively from lack of food,but that he should be destroyed violently before starvation had exhausted the last particle of the endeavor in him that made toward surviving.There were the wolves.Back and forth across the desolation drifted their howls,weaving the very air into a fabric of menace that was so tangible that he found himself,arms in the air,pressing it back from him as it might be the walls of a wind-blown tent.

Now and again the wolves,in packs of two and three,crossed his path.But they sheered clear of him.They were not in sufficient numbers,and besides they were hunting the caribou,which did not battle,while this strange creature that walked erect might scratch and bite.

In the late afternoon he came upon scattered bones where the wolves had made a kill.The debris had been a caribou calf an hour before,squawking and running and very much alive.He contemplated the bones,clean-picked and polished,pink with the cell-life in them which had not yet died.Could it possibly be that he might be that ere the day was done!Such was life,eh?A vain and fleeting thing.It was only life that pained.There was no hurt in death.To die was to sleep.It meant cessation,rest.Then why was he not content to die?

But he did not moralize long.He was squatting in the moss,a bone in his mouth,sucking at the shreds of life that still dyed it faintly pink.The sweet meaty taste,thin and elusive almost as a memory,maddened him.He closed his jaws on the bones and crunched.Sometimes it was the bone that broke,sometimes his teeth.Then he crushed the bones between rocks,pounded them to a pulp,and swallowed them.He pounded his fingers,too,in his haste,and yet found a moment in which to feel surprise at the fact that his fingers did not hurt much when caught under the descending rock.

Came frightful days of snow and rain.He did not know when he made camp,when he broke camp.He travelled in the night as much as in the day.He rested wherever he fell,crawled on whenever the dying life in him flickered up and burned less dimly.He,as a man,no longer strove.It was the life in him,unwilling to die,that drove him on.He did not suffer.His nerves had become blunted,numb,while his mind was filled with weird visions and delicious dreams.

But ever he sucked and chewed on the crushed bones of the caribou calf,the least remnants of which he had gathered up and carried with him.He crossed no more hills or divides,but automatically followed a large stream which flowed through a wide and shallow valley.He did not see this stream nor this valley.He saw nothing save visions.Soul and body walked or crawled side by side,yet apart,so slender was the thread that bound them.

He awoke in his right mind,lying on his back on a rocky ledge.The sun was shining bright and warm.Afar off he heard the squawking of caribou calves.He was aware of vague memories of rain and wind and snow,but whether he had been beaten by the storm for two days or two weeks he did not know.

For some time he lay without movement,the genial sunshine pouring upon him and saturating his miserable body with its warmth.A fine day,he thought.Perhaps he could manage to locate himself.By a painful effort he rolled over on his side.Below him flowed a wide and sluggish river.Its unfamiliarity puzzled him.Slowly he followed it with his eyes,winding in wide sweeps among the bleak,bare hills,bleaker and barer and lower-lying than any hills he had yet encountered.Slowly,deliberately,without excitement or more than the most casual interest,he followed the course of the strange stream toward the sky-line and saw it emptying into a bright and shining sea.He was still unexcited.Most unusual,he thought,a vision or a mirage—more likely a vision,a trick of his disordered mind.He was confirmed in this by sight of a ship lying at anchor in the midst of the shining sea.He closed his eyes for a while,then opened them.Strange how the vision persisted!Yet not strange.He knew there were no seas or ships in the heart of the barren lands,just as he had known there was no cartridge in the empty rifle.

He heard a snuffle behind him—a half-choking gasp or cough.Very slowly,because of his exceeding weakness and stiffness,he rolled over on his other side.He could see nothing near at hand,but he waited patiently.Again came the snuffle and cough,and outlined between two jagged rocks not a score of feet away he made out the gray head of a wolf.The sharp ears were not pricked so sharply as he had seen them on other wolves;the eyes were bleared and bloodshot,the head seemed to droop limply and forlornly.The animal blinked continually in the sunshine.It seemed sick.As he looked it snuffled and coughed again.

This,at least,was real,he thought,and turned on the other side so that he might see the reality of the world which had been veiled from him before by the vision.But the sea still shone in the distance and the ship was plainly discernible.Was it reality,after all?He closed his eyes for a long while and thought,and then it came to him.He had been making north by east,away from the Dease Divide and into the Coppermine Valley.This wide and sluggish river was the Coppermine.That shining sea was the Arctic Ocean.That ship was a whaler,strayed east,far east,from the mouth of the Mackenzie,and it was lying at anchor in Coronation Gulf.He remembered the Hudson Bay Company chart he had seen long ago,and it was all clear and reasonable to him.

He sat up and turned his attention to immediate affairs.He had worn through the blanket-wrappings,and his feet were shapeless lumps of raw meat.His last blanket was gone.Rifle and knife were both missing.He had lost his hat somewhere,with the bunch of matches in the band,but the matches against his chest were safe and dry inside the tobacco pouch and oil paper.He looked at his watch.It marked eleven o'clock and was still running.Evidently he had kept it wound.

He was calm and collected.Though extremely weak,he had no sensation of pain.He was not hungry.The thought of food was not even pleasant to him,and whatever he did was done by his reason alone.He ripped off his pants'legs to the knees and bound them about his feet.Somehow he had succeeded in retaining the tin bucket.He would have some hot water before he began what he foresaw was to be a terrible journey to the ship.

His movements were slow.He shook as with a palsy.When he started to collect dry moss,he found he could not rise to his feet.He tried again and again,then contented himself with crawling about on hands and knees.Once he crawled near to the sick wolf.The animal dragged itself reluctantly out of his way,licking its chops with a tongue which seemed hardly to have the strength to curl.The man noticed that the tongue was not the customary healthy red.It was a yellowish brown and seemed coated with a rough and half-dry mucus.

After he had drunk a quart of hot water the man found he was able to stand,and even to walk as well as a dying man might be supposed to walk.Every minute or so he was compelled to rest.His steps were feeble and uncertain,just as the wolf's that trailed him were feeble and uncertain;and that night,when the shining sea was blotted out by blackness,he knew he was nearer to it by no more than four miles.

Throughout the night he heard the cough of the sick wolf,and now and then the squawking of the caribou calves.There was life all around him,but it was strong life,very much alive and well,and he knew the sick wolf clung to the sick man's trail in the hope that the man would die first.In the morning,on opening his eyes,he beheld it regarding him with a wistful and hungry stare.It stood crouched,with tail between its legs,like a miserable and woe-begone dog.It shivered in the chill morning wind,and grinned dispiritedly when the man spoke to it in a voice that achieved no more than a hoarse whisper.

The sun rose brightly,and all morning the man tottered and fell toward the ship on the shining sea.The weather was perfect.It was the brief Indian Summer of the high latitudes.It might last a week.To-morrow or next day it might be gone.

In the afternoon the man came upon a trail.It was of another man,who did not walk,but who dragged himself on all fours.The man thought it might be Bill,but he thought in a dull,uninterested way.He had no curiosity.In fact,sensation and emotion had left him.He was no longer susceptible to pain.Stomach and nerves had gone to sleep.Yet the life that was in him drove him on.He was very weary,but it refused to die.It was because it refused to die that he still ate muskeg berries and minnows,drank his hot water,and kept a wary eye on the sick wolf.

He followed the trail of the other man who dragged himself along,and soon came to the end of it—a few fresh-picked bones where the soggy moss was marked by the foot-pads of many wolves.He saw a squat moose-hide sack,mate to his own,which had been torn by sharp teeth.He picked it up,though its weight was almost too much for his feeble fingers.Bill had carried it to the last.Ha!ha!He would have the laugh on Bill.He would survive and carry it to the ship in the shining sea.His mirth was hoarse and ghastly,like a raven's croak,and the sick wolf joined him,howling lugubriously.The man ceased suddenly.How could he have the laugh on Bill if that were Bill;if those bones,so pinky-white and clean,were Bill?

He turned away.Well,Bill had deserted him;but he would not take the gold,nor would he suck Bill's bones.Bill would have,though,had it been the other way around,he mused as he staggered on.He came to a pool of water.Stooping over in quest of minnows,he jerked his head back as though he had been stung.He had caught sight of his reflected face.So horrible was it that sensibility awoke long enough to be shocked.There were three minnows in the pool,which was too large to drain;and after several ineffectual attempts to catch them in the tin bucket he forbore.He was afraid,because of his great weakness,that he might fall in and drown.It was for this reason that he did not trust himself to the river astride one of the many drift-logs which lined its sand-spits.

That day he decreased the distance between him and the ship by three miles;the next day by two—for he was crawling now as Bill had crawled;and the end of the fifth day found the ship still seven miles away and him unable to make even a mile a day.Still the Indian Summer held on,and he continued to crawl and faint,turn and turn about;and ever the sick wolf coughed and wheezed at his heels.His knees had become raw meat like his feet,and though he padded them with the shirt from his back it was a red track he left behind him on the moss and stones.Once,glancing back,he saw the wolf licking hungrily his bleeding trail,and he saw sharply what his own end might be—unless—unless he could get the wolf.Then began as grim a tragedy of existence as was ever played—a sick man that crawled,a sick wolf that limped,two creatures dragging their dying carcasses across the desolation and hunting each other's lives.

Had it been a well wolf,it would not have mattered so much to the man;but the thought of going to feed the maw of that loathsome and all but dead thing was repugnant to him.He was finicky.His mind had begun to wander again,and to be perplexed by hallucinations,while his lucid intervals grew rarer and shorter.

He was awakened once from a faint by a wheeze close in his ear.The wolf leaped lamely back,losing its footing and falling in its weakness.It was ludicrous,but he was not amused.Nor was he even afraid.He was too far gone for that.But his mind was for the moment clear,and he lay and considered.The ship was no more than four miles away.He could see it quite distinctly when he rubbed the mists out of his eyes,and he could see the white sail of a small boat cutting the water of the shining sea.But he could never crawl those four miles.He knew that,and was very calm in the knowledge.He knew that he could not crawl half a mile.And yet he wanted to live.It was unreasonable that he should die after all he had undergone.Fate asked too much of him.And,dying,he declined to die.

It was stark madness,perhaps,but in the very grip of Death he defied Death and refused to die.

He closed his eyes and composed himself with infinite precaution.He steeled himself to keep above the suffocating languor that lapped like a rising tide through all the wells of his being.It was very like a sea,this deadly languor,that rose and rose and drowned his consciousness bit by bit.Sometimes he was all but submerged,swimming through oblivion with a faltering stroke;and again,by some strange alchemy of soul,he would find another shred of will and strike out more strongly.

Without movement he lay on his back,and he could hear,slowly drawing near and nearer,the wheezing intake and output of the sick wolf's breath.It drew closer,ever closer,through an infinitude of time,and he did not move.It was at his ear.The harsh dry tongue grated like sandpaper against his cheek.His hands shot out—or at least he willed them to shoot out.The fingers were curved like talons,but they closed on empty air.Swiftness and certitude require strength,and the man had not this strength.

The patience of the wolf was terrible.The man's patience was no less terrible.For half a day he lay motionless,fighting off unconsciousness and waiting for the thing that was to feed upon him and upon which he wished to feed.Sometimes the languid sea rose over him and he dreamed long dreams;but ever through it all,waking and dreaming,he waited for the wheezing breath and the harsh caress of the tongue.

He did not hear the breath,and he slipped slowly from some dream to the feel of the tongue along his hand.He waited.The fangs pressed softly;the pressure increased;the wolf was exerting its last strength in an effort to sink teeth in the food for which it had waited so long.But the man had waited long,and the lacerated hand closed on the jaw.

Slowly,while the wolf struggled feebly and the hand clutched feebly,the other hand crept across to a grip.Five minutes later the whole weight of the man's body was on top of the wolf.The hands had not sufficient strength to choke the wolf,but the face of the man was pressed close to the throat of the wolf and the mouth of the man was full of hair.At the end of half an hour the man was aware of a warm trickle in his throat.It was not pleasant.It was like molten lead being forced into his stomach,and it was forced by his will alone.Later the man rolled over on his back and slept.

There were some members of a scientific expedition on the whale-ship Bedford.From the deck they remarked a strange object on the shore.It was moving down the beach toward the water.They were unable to classify it,and,being scientific men,they climbed into the whale-boat alongside and went ashore to see.And they saw something that was alive but which could hardly be called a man.It was blind,unconscious.It squirmed along the ground like some monstrous worm.Most of its efforts were ineffectual,but it was persistent,and it writhed and twisted and went ahead perhaps a score of feet an hour.

Three weeks afterward the man lay in a bunk on the whale-ship Bedford,and with tears streaming down his wasted cheeks told who he was and what he had undergone.He also babbled incoherently of his mother,of sunny Southern California,and a home among the orange groves and flowers.

The days were not many after that when he sat at table with the scientific men and ship's officers.He gloated over the spectacle of so much food,watching it anxiously as it went into the mouths of others.With the disappearance of each mouthful an expression of deep regret came into his eyes.He was quite sane,yet he hated those men at meal-time.He was haunted by a fear that the food would not last.He inquired of the cook,the cabin-boy,the captain,concerning the food stores.They reassured him countless times;but he could not believe them,and pried cunningly about the lazarette to see with his own eyes.

It was noticed that the man was getting fat.He grew stouter with each day.The scientific men shook their heads and theorized.They limited the man at his meals,but still his girth increased and he swelled prodigiously under his shirt.

The sailors grinned.They knew.And when the scientific men set a watch on the man,they knew too.They saw him slouch for'ard after breakfast,and,like a mendicant,with outstretched palm,accost a sailor.The sailor grinned and passed him a fragment of sea biscuit.He clutched it avariciously,looked at it as a miser looks at gold,and thrust it into his shirt bosom.Similar were the donations from other grinning sailors.The scientific men were discreet.They let him alone.But they privily examined his bunk.It was lined with hardtack;the mattress was stuffed with hardtack;every nook and cranny was filled with hardtack.Yet he was sane.He was taking precautions against another possible famine—that was all.He would recover from it,the scientific men said;and he did,ere the Bedford's anchor rumbled down in San Francisco Bay.

万物唯此留，

生活颠簸走；

骰子失金色，

胜局多会有。

他们俩脚步蹒跚，吃力地走下河岸，有一次，那个走在前面的人还在乱石间失足摇晃了一下。他们疲惫无力，因为长期忍受苦难，脸上带着愁苦憔悴的表情。他们肩上捆着毛毯包裹的沉重行囊。那条勒在额头上的皮带帮着吊住了这些行囊。每人有一支步枪。他们都以弯腰的姿势走路，肩膀前倾，头更向前伸，眼睛俯视着地面。

“那些藏在地窖里的子弹，我们要是带两三发就好了。”走在后面的那个人说。

他的声音枯燥乏味，沉闷呆板。他说话时没有激情；前面那人一瘸一拐地走进了流过岩石、激起一片泡沫的白茫茫的小溪，没有回答。

后面那个人紧随其后。尽管河水冰冷，但他们都没有脱掉鞋袜——冷得他们脚踝生疼，两脚发木。到了河水能冲击到他们膝盖的一些地方，两人都摇晃了一下，才站稳脚跟。

那个跟在后面的人在一块光滑的大鹅卵石上滑了一下，差点儿摔倒，但他猛一用力，才又站稳了脚跟，同时发出了一声痛苦的尖叫。他好像头昏眼花，身体摇晃时伸出一只空闲的手，似乎在空中寻找支撑物。站稳之后，他又向前走去，但又摇晃了一下，差点儿摔倒。于是，他便站住不动，望着另一个从不回头的人。

他一动不动，站了足有一分钟，仿佛是在独自思考。接着，他大声叫道：

“喂，比尔，我扭伤了脚踝。”

比尔摇摇晃晃，继续趟着白茫茫的河水，没有回头。后面那个人望着他走，尽管脸上依旧没有表情，但他的眼神里却流露出一头受伤的鹿一样的神情。

前面一个人一瘸一拐地爬上远处的河岸，径直前行，没有回头。小溪里的那个人目不转睛地望着他，嘴唇微微颤抖，所以他嘴唇上下蓬乱的棕色胡子明显在抖动，他甚至不知不觉地伸出舌头来润了润嘴唇。

“比尔！”他大声喊道。这是一个坚强的人在危难中的大声恳求，但比尔没有回头。那个人望着他，只见他动作古怪，蹒跚而行，东倒西歪，吭吭哧哧，向前爬上缓坡，朝矮山上柔和的空中轮廓线走去。他望着比尔一直翻过山头，不见了踪影。于是，他掉转目光，慢慢地观察着比尔走后现在留给他的周围世界。

靠近地平线处，太阳微暗，正在闷烧，几乎被那些飘忽不定的薄雾和蒸气遮掩，给人一种密密麻麻、没有轮廓、没有外形的印象。这个人单腿站立休息，掏出手表。已经四点钟了，因为这是接近七月底或八月初的季节——他不清楚一两周内的确切日期——他知道太阳大致在西北方。他望着南面，知道那些荒凉小山后面的某个地方就是大熊湖[1]；同时，他也知道，在那个方向，北极圈[2]的禁区界线穿越了加拿大荒野。他站立的这条小溪是科珀曼河[3]的一条支流，科珀曼河向北流去，汇入加冕湾和北冰洋。他从来没有到过那里，但他曾在哈得孙湾公司的地图上见过一次。

他的目光又环顾了一下周围的世界。这是一片叫人看了发愁的景象。到处都是模糊的地平线。那些小山都非常低矮。没有树木，没有灌木，没有青草——只有一片辽阔可怕的荒野，他的眼里即刻露出了恐惧的神色。

“比尔！”他低声连喊了两次，“比尔！”

他畏缩在白茫茫的河水中央，仿佛这茫茫荒野正在用排山倒海之势向他压来，摆出残忍、得意的威风来压垮他。他开始像发疟疾一样颤抖，手里的枪扑通落进了水里，这才惊醒了他。他跟恐惧斗争，打起精神，在水里摸索，又找到了枪。他把行囊向左肩移了一下，以便减轻扭伤的脚踝的一部分重量。随后，他就慢慢地、小心地向河岸继续走去，疼得他闪闪缩缩。

他没有停步，不顾疼痛，匆匆忙忙，发疯一般拼命爬上斜坡，爬上伙伴消失的那个山头——比起那个一瘸一拐、颠簸前进的伙伴，他的样子更滑稽可笑。但是，到了山头，他看到一个了无生机的浅谷。他又和恐惧斗争，战胜它，又把行囊向左肩移了移，步履蹒跚，走下山坡。

谷底浸透了水，厚厚的苔藓像海绵一样，紧贴在水面上。他每走一步，水就从他的脚下喷溅出来，他每一次提脚，湿苔藓都会吸住他的脚不肯放松，最终发出呼哧呼哧的声音。他小心翼翼，从一块沼地走到另一块沼地，然后顺着比尔的脚印，穿过一堆一堆的，像突出在这片苔藓海里的小岛一样的岩礁。

尽管孤身一人，但他没有迷路。他知道再向前，他就会走到一个小湖旁边，那里有枯死的、小小的、极细的云杉。小湖名叫提青尼其利，意为“小棍地”，处在一片岬地。而且，还有一条小溪流入那个湖里，溪水不是白茫茫的。那条小溪上有灯芯草——这一点他记得一清二楚——但没有树木，他可以顺着这条小溪，一直走到溪流尽头的分水岭。他会翻过这道分水岭，走到另一条向西流去的小溪的源头。他可以顺着水流，走到它注入狄斯河的地方。到了那里，他会在一条翻了的独木舟下面找到一个密藏处，上面堆有许多石头。这个密藏处里有他那支空枪需要的弹药，还有钓钩、钓线和一张小渔网——都是打猎捕食的有用工具。他也会找到面粉——不多——还有一块熏肉和一些蚕豆。

比尔会在那里等他，然后他们会顺着狄斯河向南，划着小船到达大熊湖。接着，他们会向南穿过这条湖，一直向南，直至到达麦肯齐河[4]。到了那里，他们还要向南，继续南行。此时，冬天就怎么也追不上他们了，而且那些湍流结冰，天气变得干冷。他们一路向南走到哈得孙湾公司一个暖和的贸易站，那里的树木长得高大茂盛，吃的东西也很多。

这个人挣扎向前时，就是这样想的。不过，像他努力拼着体力一样，他的头脑也在同样苦苦思索，尽力想着比尔没有抛弃他，想着比尔肯定会在密藏处等他。他不得不这样想，否则他就用不着这样努力，早就会躺下死了。当像暗淡的圆球一样的太阳慢慢沉入西北方时，他多次考虑着在冬天降临之前他和比尔南逃的每一寸路。他一遍又一遍地念想着密藏处和哈得孙湾公司贸易站的食物。他已经两天没吃东西了；他没有吃到他想吃的东西的时间更长。他常常弯下腰，摘一些浅色的沼地浆果，把它们放进嘴里嚼嚼，咽下去。沼地浆果是包裹在一点浆水里的小粒种子。放进嘴里，就化了，种子嚼起来酸辣苦涩。这个人知道这种浆果没有营养，但他仍怀着希望耐心地嚼着，不顾及理智和常识。

走到九点钟，他在一块岩礁上绊了一下，因为极度疲惫和虚弱，他踉跄了一下摔倒在地。他侧躺了一会儿，没有动弹。随后，他脱下绑行囊的皮带，笨拙地挣扎着坐起来。天还没有黑，借着盘桓的暮色，他在乱石中四处摸索，想找到几片干苔藓。他收集一堆后，就生起了火——一堆闷烧冒烟的火——而且在上面放了一白铁罐子水去烧。

打开行囊之后，他做的第一件事就是清点火柴。有六十七根。为了确定，他数了三遍，把它们分成几束，用油纸包起来，一束放进他的空烟草袋，另一束放进他的破帽的内圈，第三束放进贴胸的衬衫。做完后，一阵恐慌向他袭来。于是，他把它们统统拿出来打开，又数了一遍。还是六十七根。

他在火边烘着潮湿的鞋袜。鹿皮鞋浸水，成了碎片。毡袜多处磨破，两只脚磨破了皮，都在流血。一只脚踝血管胀得直跳，他仔细检查了一下。只见它已经肿得跟膝盖一样粗了。他带有两条毯子，他从其中一条撕下一长绺，紧紧捆住那只脚踝，又撕下几绺，裹在脚上，代替鹿皮鞋和袜子，随后喝下那罐热气腾腾的开水，给手表上好发条，爬进了两条毯子当中。

他睡得像死人一样。午夜前后的短暂黑暗来而又去。太阳从东北方升起——至少那个方向出现了曙光，因为太阳被乌云遮住了。

六点钟，他醒来，静静地仰躺在那里，仰望灰蒙蒙的天空，知道自己饿了。当他支起胳膊肘翻过身时，一阵响亮的呼哧声把他吓了一跳，只见一头公鹿正在用机警好奇的神情凝视着他。这只动物离他不过有五十英尺。这个人的脑海里马上出现了鹿肉排放在一堆火上烤得咝咝响的情景。他下意识地伸手抓起那支空枪，瞄准，扣动扳机。公鹿哼了一声，飞跃而去，逃过岩礁时，蹄子嗒嗒作响。

这个人骂了一句，扔掉空枪，一边开始拖着身体站起来，一边大声呻吟。这是一项缓慢费劲的工作。他的关节像生锈的铰链似的，在关节窝里因摩擦力大而发出刺耳的声音，每次屈伸都要费尽九牛二虎之力才能做到。他终于站稳了脚跟，又花了一分钟左右才挺起腰，这样他才能像一个人那样挺直站立。

他爬上一个小圆丘，看了看眼前的风景。没有树木，没有灌木丛，只有一望无际灰蒙蒙的苔藓，偶尔有些灰色岩石、灰色小湖和灰色小溪，算是一点点缀。天空灰蒙蒙的，没有太阳，也没有太阳的影子。他根本不知道哪里是北方，也忘了前一天晚上他是怎么走到这里的。但是，他没有迷路。这他明白。不久，他就会走到那个“小棍地”，他感到它就在左边的某个地方，距离不远——说不定翻过下一个低矮的小山就到了。

他返回去，打好行囊，准备动身。他确信那三束分别存放的火柴还在，但他没有停下来再数它们。不过，他的确迟疑了一下，在考虑一只短粗的鹿皮袋。袋子不大。他两只手就可以把它盖住。他知道它重十五磅——差不多像行囊里的其他东西一样重——这使他发了愁。最后，他把它放在一边，开始卷行囊。之后，他又停下来，盯着那只短粗的鹿皮袋。他赶忙提起鹿皮袋，用警觉的目光看了看四周，仿佛这片荒野要设法从他手里把它夺走似的；等到他站起来，摇摇晃晃开始一天的行程时，这只袋子仍旧装在他背后的行囊里。

他向左边走去，不时地停下来吃沼地浆果。那只扭伤的脚踝已经僵直，他跛得更加明显，但和胃痛相比，脚疼算不了什么。饥饿的阵痛非常剧烈，好像有什么西在不断咬噬着他的胃，疼得他无法把思想集中在他抵达“小棍地”必须走的路线上。沼地浆果并没有减轻这种阵痛，它们令人不快的味道使他的舌头和上腭疼痛难忍。

他走到一个山谷，那里的岩雷鸟[5]从岩石和沼地呼呼振翅飞起。它们发出的是“咯——咯——咯”的叫声。他朝它们投石子，但没有打中。他把行囊放在地上，像猫逮麻雀一样悄悄走过去。锋利的岩石划破了他的裤腿，直到膝盖流出的血在地上留下一道血迹；而这种痛苦消失在了饥饿的痛苦之中。他爬过潮湿的苔藓，衣服湿透了，浑身发冷；但是，他没有意识到这一点，他想吃东西的念头那么强烈。岩雷鸟总是在他的面前呼呼飞起，到后来，它们“咯——咯——咯”的叫声简直变成了对他的嘲笑。于是，他咒骂它们，伴随着它们的叫声对它们大声叫喊。

有一次，他爬到了一只一定是睡着了的岩雷鸟旁边。直到它从岩石角落迎面飞起，他才看到。他像那只飞起的岩雷鸟一样吃惊，猛然抓了一把，手里留下了三根尾羽。他望着它飞走，心里恨恨的，好像它做了什么对不起他的错事。随后，他返回原地，背起了行囊。

随着一天慢慢过去，他走进了山谷或说是沼地，那里的猎物比较多。一群驯鹿走了过去，有二十多头，都在步枪的射程内，让他抓狂。他有一种想追赶它们的疯狂欲望，他确信自己能追捕到它们。一只黑狐狸朝他走来，嘴里叼着一只岩雷鸟。这个人喊了一声。这是一种可怕的喊声，那只狐狸吓得飞奔而去，却没有丢下岩雷鸟。

傍晚时分，他顺着一条因含石灰而呈乳白色的小溪走去。这条小溪穿过一块块稀疏的灯芯草地。他紧紧地抓住这些灯芯草的根部，拔起一种类似洋葱苗似的东西，这东西还没有木瓦钉大。它很嫩，他嚼起来会发出嘎吱嘎吱的声音，仿佛很美味。但是，它的纤维却嚼不动。它是由浸透了水的丝状纤维组成，像浆果一样，完全没有营养。他扔下行囊，手脚并用爬进灯芯草丛，像牛一般嘎吱嘎吱地嚼了起来。

他十分疲倦，常常想休息——躺下睡个睡觉；但是，他又不得不继续前进——并不是因为他渴望赶到“小棍地”，多半是因为饥饿驱使。他在小水坑里找青蛙，用指甲挖土找蚯蚓，尽管他知道，在这遥远的北方，既没有青蛙，也没有蚯蚓。

他徒劳地看了每个水坑；直到漫长的黄昏来临时，他才在一个水坑里发现了一条孤零零、像鲦鱼一样大小的鱼。他一只胳膊伸进水里，一直没到肩膀，但它又躲开了他。他伸出双手去捉，搅起了坑底的乳白色泥浆。他激动之中掉到了坑里，湿到了腰部。此刻，水太浑浊了，不可能看到鱼，他只好等待泥浆沉淀下去。

他又逮了起来，直到水再次搅浑。但是，他等不及了。他解下身上的白铁桶，开始舀坑里的水；起初，他拼命向外舀，溅得满身都是水，舀出去的水距离太近，水又流回了坑里。他更加小心地舀着，尽力冷静，尽管他的心咚咚直跳，两手颤抖。半小时后，坑里的水差不多干了。剩下的水还不到一杯。但是，根本没有鱼；他发现石头间有一条隐藏的裂缝。那条鱼已经从那里钻进了旁边一个相连的更大的坑里——坑里的水他一天一夜都舀不干。要是他早知道这个裂缝，他一开始就会堵上它，那条鱼便归他所有了。

这样想着，他崩溃地倒在湿地上。起初，他轻声哭泣，随后便冲着团团围住自己的无情荒野号啕大哭；后来，他又大声号了好长时间。

他生了一堆火，喝了几罐热水暖和暖和身体，并像前一天夜里那样在一块岩礁上露宿。他最后做的一件事儿，就是看了看火柴是不是干燥，然后给手表上好了发条。毛毯又湿又冷。脚踝簌簌作痛。但是，他只知道自己肚子饿；在不安的睡眠里，他梦见了一桌桌酒席和一次次宴会，还有各种可能端放到桌上的食物。

醒来时，他既寒冷又恶心。没有太阳。灰蒙蒙的大地和天空变得越来越浓重深沉。一阵阴风刮来，刚开始下的雪铺白了一座座小山顶。他周围的空气越来越浓，变成了白茫茫一片。此时，他生起了一堆火，又烧了开水。这是雨夹雪，雪花又大又湿。起初，一落到地上，它们就融化了，但后来越下越多，铺满了地面，压灭了那堆火，把他那些当作燃料的苔藓也给糟蹋了。

这对他是一个信号，他背起行囊，蹒跚前行，不知道去哪里。他既不关心“小棍地”，也不关心比尔和狄斯河边那个翻了的独木舟下面的密藏处。他被“吃”这个词控制住了。他饿疯了。只要这条路能带他走出这个谷底，他根本不注意自己走的是什么路。他在湿雪里摸索前进，走到湿漉漉的沼地浆果那里，随后一边连根拔起灯芯草，一边摸索前进。然而，灯芯草既没有味道，也填不饱肚子。他又发现了一种酸味野草，就把能找到的都吃了下去，但找到的并不多，因为它是一种蔓生植物，容易埋藏在几英寸厚的雪下面。

那天夜里，他既没有生火，也没有热水，就钻到毯子下面睡觉，夜里常常饿醒。雪已经变成了冷雨。他感到雨落在他仰起的脸上，醒来了多次。天亮了——又是灰蒙蒙的一天，没有太阳。雨已经停了。强烈的饥饿感也消失了。就对食物的渴望而言，那种敏感性已经耗尽了。他的胃里隐隐作痛，但这并没有使他过分烦恼。他更加理性，又一次主要对“小棍地”和狄斯河边的密藏处感兴趣了。

他把撕剩的那条毯子扯成一绺一绺的，裹住那双流血的脚，同时重新扎紧受伤的脚踝，为一天的行程做好准备。收拾行囊时，他对那个短粗的鹿皮袋踌躇了很久，但最后还是随身带上了它。

雨落雪化，只有山头还是白色。太阳出来了，他成功地确定了罗盘的方位，尽管他知道现在他迷了路。在前两天的漫游中，他也许已经向左走得太远了。这时，他向右边走去，减少可能的偏差，以便走上正路。

尽管饥饿的阵痛不再那么剧烈，但他知道自己非常虚弱。他摘沼地浆果、拔灯芯草时，常常不得不停下来休息。他感觉舌头干肿，好像上面长满了细毛，放在嘴里很苦。心脏给他添了很多麻烦。他每走几分钟，心脏就开始无情地咚咚直跳，随后上下起伏，急剧跳动，痛苦不堪，呼吸困难，头晕目眩，有气无力。

中午时分，他在一个大水坑里发现了两条鲦鱼。尽管不可能把坑里的水舀干，但他现在比较镇静，设法用白铁罐子捞起它们。它们还没有他的小指长，但他并不是特别饿。胃里的隐痛越来越麻木，越来越微弱了。他的胃好像在打盹一般。他把鱼生吃了下去，费力而又小心地咀嚼着，因为吃东西成了一种纯理性的动作。尽管他根本没有吃的欲望，但他知道，为了活下去，他必须吃。

傍晚时分，他又逮了三条鲦鱼，吃了两条，留下一条当作第二天的早饭。太阳已经晒干了零散碎片的苔藓，他能用热水暖和身体了。这一天，他走了不到十英里；第二天，只要心脏准许，他就往前走，只走了五英里。但是，胃里却没有一点不安的感觉。它已经睡着了。他也来到了一个陌生地方，驯鹿越来越多，狼也越来越多了。狼嗥声常常飘过荒野，有一次他还看到三条狼在他前面的路上鬼鬼祟祟地溜过。

又过了一夜。第二天早晨，他更加清醒，就解开扎着短粗鹿皮袋的皮绳，从袋口倒出一股黄灿灿的粗金粉和天然块金。他把金子大致一分为二，一半裹在一块毯子里，藏在一块突出的岩礁上，另一半又放回袋子。他又从那条剩余的毯子上撕下几绺，用来裹脚。他仍旧紧握着枪，因为狄斯河边的密藏处有子弹。这是一个雾天，他又有了饥饿感。他有气无力，不时头晕眼花，看不清楚。现在，对他来说，一绊就倒已不是什么稀奇事儿；有一次，他绊了一跤，正好摔进一个岩雷鸟窝。那里有四只刚孵出一天的小岩雷鸟——那些活蹦乱跳的小不点儿只够他吃一口。他狼吞虎咽，把它们活活塞进嘴里，像嚼蛋壳一样嘎吱嘎吱地吃了起来。母岩雷鸟大声尖叫着在他的周围扑来扑去。他以枪当棍想把它打翻，但它闪开了。他扔石子打它，碰巧打断了它的一只翅膀。岩雷鸟拖着受伤的翅膀飞走了，他紧追不放。

那些小鸟反倒刺激了他的胃口。他拖着那只受伤的脚踝，一蹦一跳，磕磕绊绊，时而扔石子，时而粗声尖叫，时而一瘸一拐，默默前行，摔倒后坚强而又耐心地爬起来，或者在头晕支撑不住时用手揉揉眼睛。

追着追着他就穿过了谷底沼地，发现了浸水苔藓上的一些脚印。这不是他自己的脚印——他可以看出来。这一定是比尔的。但是，他不能停步，因为母岩雷鸟正在向前跑。他要先逮住它，然后再回来查看。

他把母岩雷鸟追得筋疲力尽，但他自己也筋疲力尽了。它侧躺在那里，气喘吁吁。他也侧躺在那里气喘吁吁，距离有十几米，但无力爬到它那里。等他恢复过来时，母岩雷鸟也恢复了过来。他那只渴望的手向它伸过去时，它扑棱棱飞到了他够不到的地方。他又追了起来。夜幕降临，它最终逃脱了。他身体虚弱，绊了一跤，向前栽倒，划破了脸颊，行囊压在背上，好一阵子一动不动，后来才翻过身，侧躺在地上，给手表上好发条，一直在那里躺到第二天早晨。

又是一个雾天。他最后一条毯子已有一半做了包脚布。他没有找到比尔的踪迹。这不要紧。饥饿逼得他走投无路——只是——只是他不知道比尔是不是也迷了路。中午时分，烦人的行囊压得他受不了。他又一次把金子分开，这次只把其中一半倒在地上。到了下午，他扔掉了剩下的那些，只剩下了半条毯子、白铁罐子和那支步枪。

一种幻觉开始困扰他。他确信他还剩一颗子弹。它在枪膛里，只是他已经忽略了。另一方面，他始终明白，枪膛是空的。但是，这种幻觉挥之不去。他几个小时都在竭力摆脱这种幻觉。后来，他猛地打开枪，面对的是空枪膛。这种失望非常痛苦，好像他真的希望会找到那颗子弹。

他继续跋涉了半小时，这时那种幻觉再次出现。他又阻止它，而它仍然存在。最后，为了自我安慰，他又打开枪膛，使自己不要相信。有时，他越想越远，纯粹成了一台机器，一边向前跋涉，一边让种种奇思怪想像虫子一样咬噬他的大脑。但是，这种脱离现实的幻想稍纵即逝，因为饥饿的痛苦总是把他唤回。有一次，他看到一个差点儿让他昏倒的东西，突然从这种幻想中惊醒。他像酒鬼似的晃动了几下，以免跌倒。他面前站着一匹马。一匹马！他无法相信自己的眼睛。他眼前一片模糊，金星乱迸。他使劲地揉了揉眼睛，好让自己看清楚，这不是马，而是一头大棕熊。这头野兽正在用一种好斗的狐疑目光打量着他。

这个人举枪上肩，举起一半才记起来没有子弹。他放下枪，从臀部镶珠的刀鞘里抽出了猎刀。他面前是肉和生命。他用大拇指试了试刀刃。刀刃异常锋利。刀尖也非常锋利。他本来会扑到熊的身上，杀了它，但是，他的心脏开始警告性地咚咚直跳。接着又向上狂跳，头像上了铁箍似的，大脑渐渐眩晕。

恐惧的巨浪驱散了他不顾一切的勇气。他在虚弱之中，要是那只动物攻击他，怎么办？他挺起身子，摆出一副威风凛凛的架势，紧握猎刀，死死地盯着那头熊。那头熊笨拙地向前走了两步，后腿直立，发出试探性的咆哮。要是这个人逃跑，它就会追上去；但是，这个人没有逃跑。他现在因恐惧而产生的勇气使他振奋了起来。他也发出野蛮可怕的咆哮，吐露出那种生死攸关、连接生命最深处的恐惧。

那头熊缓缓地向一边移动，发出威胁的咆哮，它自己被这个站得笔直、毫不畏惧的神秘动物吓得胆战心惊。这个人没有动，如雕像一样站立，直到危险过去，才一阵颤抖，倒在潮湿的苔藓上。

他恢复平静，继续前进，现在又产生了一种新的恐惧。这不是害怕他会束手无策地死于缺食的恐惧，而是害怕还没等饥饿耗尽他的最后一点求生力，他就会被残忍地消灭。这里有狼。狼嗥声在荒野上飘来飘去，在空中交织成一片危险的罗网。他发现这网触手可摸，吓得他举起双手，把它向后推去，就像它是被风吹斜的帐篷一般。

那些狼不时地三三两两从他前面走过。但是，它们都避开他。一是因为它们数量不多，此外，它们要找的是不会搏斗的驯鹿，而这个直立走路的奇怪动物可能会又抓又咬。

傍晚时分，他碰到了一些散乱的骨头，因为那些狼曾经在这里咬死过一只动物。这些残骸一小时前还是一头小驯鹿，一边尖叫，一边奔跑，活蹦乱跳的。他凝视着这些骨头，它们被啃得精光发亮，现出生命还未褪尽的粉红色。天黑之前，他也可能变成这样吗？这就是生命吗？真是一种转瞬即逝的空虚东西。只有活着才会痛苦。死了，就不会有任何烦恼。死就是睡觉。它意味着结束和休息。那他为什么不愿意死呢？

不过，他并没有对自己说教太久。他蹲在苔藓地里，嘴里衔着一根骨头，吮吸着仍然使骨头微微泛红的残余生命。甜美的肉味像回忆一样隐隐约约，难以捉摸，却让他要发疯。他咬住骨头，嘎吱嘎吱地嚼着。有时他咬碎骨头，有时却硌碎自己的牙齿。于是，他就用岩石砸碎骨头，把它捣成酱，然后咽下去。匆忙之中，他有时也砸到自己的手指，而让他一时感到吃惊的是，石头砸下去，他的手指并不觉得很痛。

可怕的雨雪又来了。他不知道什么时候露宿，什么时候启程。他白天黑夜都在赶路。他倒在哪里就在哪里休息。每当垂危的生命闪起火花、微微燃烧时，他就向前爬行。他不再像人那样挣扎了。驱使他向前走的是他的生命，因为生命本身不愿死亡。他不再痛苦。他的神经已经变得迟钝麻木；此时，他的脑海充满了怪异的幻影和美妙的梦境。

但是，他总不断吮吸和咀嚼那头小驯鹿的碎骨头，这是他收集起来带上的一点残屑。他不再翻山越岭，只是顺着一条流过宽阔浅谷的溪水机械地走去。他既没有看到这条小溪，也没有看到这道山谷，只看到了幻影。尽管灵魂和肉体并排前行或爬行，但它们彼此分开，相互之间的联系微乎其微。

他醒来时，神智健全，仰躺在一块岩石上。太阳温暖明亮。他听到远处传来一群小驯鹿的尖叫声。他只隐约记得下过雨雪、刮过风，但却不知道他被暴风雨吹打了两天还是两周。

他一动不动地躺了一段时间，温和的太阳照在他的身上，也许他可以设法确定自己的方位。他用力侧翻过身体。下面是一条流得很慢且很宽的河。这条陌生的河使他困惑不解。他慢慢地顺着河望去，宽阔的河流蜿蜒穿行在光秃秃的小荒山之间，那些小山比他碰到过的任何小山都更光秃、更荒凉、更低矮。他缓慢地，从容地，不动声色地，或者至多抱着极其偶然的兴致，顺着这条奇怪的河流的方向，朝地平线望去，看到它注入了明亮闪光的大海。他仍然不动声色。太奇怪了，他想，这也许是幻影或海市蜃楼——十有八九是幻影，是他的错乱神经搞的鬼。他看到闪亮的大海上停泊着一艘轮船，就更加坚信这是幻影了。他闭了一会儿眼睛，然后又睁开。奇怪，那种幻影居然挥之不去！然而，这并不奇怪。他知道，在荒野中央绝不会有什么大海或轮船，就像他知道他的空枪里没有子弹一样。

他听到背后传来了吸鼻声——仿佛是喘不过气或咳嗽的声音。由于他极度虚弱和僵硬，于是他慢慢地翻了一个身。他看不到附近有什么东西，但他耐心地等待着。吸鼻子和咳嗽的声音再次传来，在距离不到二十英尺的两块锯齿状的岩石之间，他看到了一匹灰狼的脑袋。那双尖耳朵并不像他见过的其他狼那样尖尖竖起；它的眼睛黯淡无光，布满血丝；脑袋好像可怜无力地耷拉着。这匹狼在太阳下不停地眨着眼，好像有病。他看着它时，它又发出了吸鼻子和咳嗽的声音。

至少这是真的，他一边想，一边翻过身，以便看清先前被幻影遮住的现实世界。但是，大海依旧在远处闪亮，那艘轮船清晰可见。难道这是真的吗？他闭了好一阵子眼睛，寻思着，那情景又出现在眼前。他一直在朝北偏东走，远离狄斯分水岭，进入了科珀曼河谷。这条缓慢宽阔的河就是科珀曼河。那片闪亮的大海是北冰洋。那是一艘捕鲸船，从麦肯齐河口出发，偏东，太偏东了，停泊在加冕湾。他记起了很久以前见过的那张哈得孙湾公司的地图。在他看来，这一切都清清楚楚、合情合理。

他坐起来，把注意力转向了眼前的事儿。他已经磨穿了裹在脚上的毯子，脚烂得没有一处好肉。最后一条毯子也用完了。步枪和猎刀也都不见了。他不知道把帽子丢在了什么地方，帽圈里那束火柴也丢了，但贴胸放在烟草袋里油纸包裹的火柴安然无恙，还是干的。他看了看手表。时间指向了十一点钟，手表还在走。显然，他一直没有忘了上发条。

他冷静沉着。尽管极度虚弱，但他没有任何疼痛的感觉。他不饿。就连想到食物也无法给他带来快感，而且无论做什么，他都只凭理智。他齐膝撕下两截裤腿，裹住双脚。他总算保住了那只白铁罐子。他打算先喝点热水，再开始向那艘轮船走去，他预见到这是一段可怕的路程。

他动作缓慢，像中风似的哆嗦着。他开始收集干苔时，才发现自己站不起来了。他试了一遍又一遍，后来甘愿手膝并用爬行。有一次，他爬到了那匹病狼附近。那匹狼一边不情愿地拖着身子离开他，一边用那条好像几乎无力卷曲的舌头舔着嘴。这个人注意到它的舌头不是通常那种健康的红色，而是一种淡黄褐色，好像蒙着一层粗糙半干的黏液。

喝过热水之后，这个人发现自己能站起来了，甚至还能像生命垂危的人那样走路。他每走一分钟左右，就不得不休息。他脚步踉跄无力，就像跟在他后面的那匹狼一样踉跄无力。那天夜里，当黑暗笼罩了闪亮的大海时，他知道他离大海只是近了不到四英里。

整整一夜，他都听到那匹病狼的咳嗽声，有时还听到那群小驯鹿的尖叫声。他周围都是生命，但那是强壮的生命，非常活泼健康；同时，他知道，那匹病狼对自己紧跟不舍，是希望自己先死。第二天早晨，他一睁开眼，就看到这匹狼正用一种如饥似渴的目光瞪着他。它夹着尾巴蹲伏在那里，好像一条可怜巴巴、愁眉苦脸的狗。它在早晨的寒风中哆哆嗦嗦。当这个人用一种只是嘶哑的低语声对它说话时，它有气无力地龇着牙。

太阳灿烂地升了起来。整个早晨，这个人都跌跌撞撞地朝闪亮大海上的那条轮船走去。天气好极了。这是高纬度地区短暂的晚春。它可能持续一周。也许明天或后天就会结束。

下午，这个人发现了踪迹。那是另一个人的踪迹，那个人不是步行，而是爬行。他认为可能是比尔，但他只是漠不关心地想想而已。他没有什么好奇心。事实上，他已经失去了知觉和感情，不再感到痛苦。他的胃和神经都已经睡着了。然而，内在的生命驱使他前进。他疲惫不堪，但他的生命不愿死去。正是因为生命不愿死，他才仍然吃沼地浆果和鲦鱼、喝热水，时刻提防那匹病狼。

他沿着那个拖着身体前进的人的踪迹向前走去，不久便走到了尽头——那里有几根刚啃光的骨头，潮湿的苔藓上留有许多狼的蹄印。他看到了一个跟他自己的那个一模一样的短粗鹿皮袋，但已经被尖利的牙齿撕破了。尽管他那无力的手几乎拿不动这样沉重的袋子，但他还是把它提了起来。比尔到死都带着它。哈！哈！他可以嘲笑比尔了。他要活下去，把它带到闪亮的大海的那艘轮船上。他的笑声嘶哑可怕，就像乌鸦嘎嘎的叫声，那匹病狼也随着他，可怜巴巴地嗥叫着。那个人突然停住了笑声。这要真的是比尔的骸骨，如果这些粉里透红、啃得精光的骨头要是比尔的话，他怎么能嘲笑呢？

他转身走开了。不错，是比尔抛弃了他。但是，他不会拿走那袋金子，也不会吸比尔的骨头。不过，要是事儿颠倒过来，比尔就会那样做，他一边蹒跚前进，一边沉思。他来到一个水坑边，弯腰寻找鲦鱼时，猛地仰起头，好像被蜇了一下似的。他看到了自己映在水里的脸庞。脸庞可怕极了，一下子唤醒了休克已久的感觉能力。坑里有三条鲦鱼，但坑太大了，舀不干。他用白铁罐子去逮，试了好几次都无济于事。他极度虚弱，怕自己会跌进去淹死。正因为如此，尽管沙洲沿岸有许多浮木，但他也没有跨上其中一根顺河而下。

那天，他和那艘轮船之间的距离缩短了三英里。第二天，又缩短了两英里——因为现在他像比尔先前那样在爬行。到第五天结束时，他发现轮船离他仍然还有七英里。而他一天连一英里也爬不到。好天气仍在持续，他继续爬行晕倒，晕倒爬行；那匹病狼咳嗽和喘息着，始终跟在他的后面。他的膝盖像他的脚一样磨出了生肉；尽管他用背上的衬衫来垫膝盖，但他身后的苔藓和石头上还是留下了一路血迹。有一次，他回头看时，只见那匹狼正在如饥似渴地舔他的血迹，他清晰地看到了自己的结局可能是什么——除非——除非他杀了这匹狼。于是，一幕从来没有上演过的无情的求生悲剧就开始了——病人一路爬行，病狼一路跛行，两个生灵拖着垂死的躯壳穿过荒野，谁都想要了对方的命。

这要是一匹健康的狼，这个人就会觉得不大要紧。但是，一想到自己要喂这样一匹令人作呕、几乎快死的狼，他就感到厌恶。他过于挑剔，又开始胡思乱想，各种幻觉又让他不知所措，神志清醒的时间越来越少了。

有一次，他从昏迷中被一种贴在他耳边的喘息声惊醒。那匹狼一瘸一拐地跳回去，它身体虚弱，失足摔倒。尽管那情景滑稽可笑，但他并不开心，甚至也不害怕。他也快要死了。不过，他的头脑暂时清醒。于是，他躺在那里，仔细考虑。那艘船离他不过四英里。他擦亮眼睛后，可以看得一清二楚；他还可以看到一条在闪亮的大海上破浪前进的小船的白帆。他却绝不可能爬完这四英里。这他知道，而且知道之后非常镇静。他知道他连半英里也爬不了了。但是，他还是要活下去。在经历所有的一切后，他要死，是不切实际的。命运对他实在太苛刻了。然而，尽管奄奄一息，但他还是不愿死。也许这种想法完全是发疯，但就是在死神的魔掌里，他也会蔑视死神，不愿去死。

他闭上眼睛，小心翼翼，保持镇静。倦怠像涨潮一样，从他身体的所有部位涌上来，他硬起心肠，决心要战胜这种令人窒息的倦怠。但这种致命的倦怠就像大海一样涨了又涨，一点一点地淹没了他的意识。有时，他几乎被完全淹没，划动双手，颤抖着游过一片盲区；有时他又会凭着一种奇怪的心灵作用，找到了一丝毅力，更加有力地游着。

他一动不动，仰躺在那里，听到病狼气喘吁吁的呼吸声慢慢地越来越近了。经过漫长的时间，它越来越近，不断靠近，但他没有动。它到了他的耳边。那条粗糙干涩的舌头像砂纸一样摩擦他的脸颊。他的两只手呼地伸出来——或者至少他决意要它们伸出来。他的手指弯得像鹰爪一样，但它们抓了个空。敏捷和准确需要力量，这个人没有这种力量。

那匹狼的耐心非常可怕。这个人的耐心也不是不可怕。他半天都躺着不动，竭力避免昏迷，等着那个要吃他、他也想吃对方的东西。有时，疲倦的浪潮向他涌上来，他做起了一个又一个长梦。然而，在整个过程中，无论是醒是梦，他都在等着那种呼哧呼哧的喘息和舌头的粗糙抚摸。他没有听到这种喘息，慢慢地从梦里醒过来，感到那条舌头在顺着他的一只手舔动。他等待着。

狼牙轻轻地压着，压力渐渐加大；狼正在尽最后一点力气设法把牙齿咬进它等了很久的食物。但是，这个人也等了很久，那只被咬破了的手也扣住了狼颚。慢慢地，在狼微弱挣扎，他的手无力抓紧时，另一只手慢慢地伸过来抓住。五分钟后，这个人全身的重量都压在了狼的身上。尽管两只手的力量不足以把狼掐死，但这个人的脸紧紧地压住了狼的咽喉，已是满嘴狼毛。半小时后，这个人意识到一股温暖的液体慢慢地流进他的喉咙。这并不舒服，就像熔铅被硬灌进了他的胃里，而且仅仅凭着他的意志硬灌了下去。随后，这个人翻过身，仰面睡去。

“贝德福德号”捕鲸船上有一些科学考察队队员。他们从甲板上觉察到岸上有一个奇怪的东西。它正沿着沙滩移向海水。他们分不清那是什么。于是，作为科考队员，他们就爬进旁边的一只捕鲸艇，到岸上去察看。接着，他们就看到了一个活着的东西，但简直难以把它称为人。它眼睛失明，不省人事，像一条大虫子似的在地上蠕动前进。它用的劲儿大多数都不起作用，但它坚持不懈，挣扎扭动，一小时大约向前爬二十英尺。

三个星期后，这个人躺在“贝德福德号”捕鲸船的床上，眼泪一边顺着他憔悴的脸颊向下流，一边说出了他是谁和他经历的一切。同时，他又语无伦次地说到了他的母亲，说到了阳光灿烂的南加州，说到了橘树和花丛中的一个家。

没过多少天，他就同那些科考队员和高级船员坐在餐桌吃起了饭。他贪婪地望着面前这么多好吃的东西，焦急地看着它进入别人的嘴里。别人每咽下一口，他的眼里就会流露出一种深深遗憾的表情。他心智相当健全，但每当吃饭时，他都憎恨那些人。恐惧缠住了他，他害怕粮食维持不了多久。他向厨师、船上的服务员和船长打听食物的贮量。他们向他保证了无数次，但他还是不相信他们，于是就狡猾地溜到贮藏室附近去亲自窥探。

这个人渐渐胖了起来。他每天都在发胖。那些科考队员都摇了摇头，提出了他们的看法。他们限制了这个人的饭量，但他的腰围还在加大，衬衣也被撑起来了，肚子鼓得惊人。

水手们都咧着嘴笑。他们心里有数。而当那些科考队员监视那个人时，他们也明白了。早饭后，他们看到他无精打采地向前走去，而且像乞丐一样，向一个水手伸出手掌。那个水手咧嘴笑了笑，递给他一块压缩面包。他贪婪地一把抓住，像守财奴看着金子一样看着它，然后把它塞进了衬衫里面。其他咧嘴而笑的水手也送给了他类似的东西。这些科考队员小心谨慎，不再管他。但是，他们常常会暗中检查他的床铺。他的床上摆着一排排硬面包，床垫都塞满了硬面包；角角落落也都塞满了硬面包。然而，他神志清醒。他是在预防可能发生的另一次饥荒——仅此而已。“他会恢复过来的。”科考队员们说。事实也是如此，“贝德福德号”还没有在旧金山湾隆隆抛下铁锚，他就恢复过来了。

注释

[1]大熊湖，位于加拿大西北地区，是该地区第一大湖，也是北美第四大湖和世界第八大湖。湖水从大熊河流入马更些河。

[2]北极圈，是指北寒带与北温带的界线。其范围包括格陵兰、北欧和俄罗斯北部，以及加拿大北部。

[3]科珀曼河，流经加拿大纽纳武特地区的基蒂克美奥特区和西北地区的史密斯堡区北部。在爱斯基摩居民点科珀曼附近注入北冰洋的加冕湾。以钓捕北极红点鲑著称。

[4]麦肯齐河，是北美洲仅次于密西西比河的第二长河，是加拿大最大的河流，源于加拿大落基山脉东麓，最后入北冰洋波弗特海。

[5]岩雷鸟，鸟纲，松鸡科。俗名，雪鸡，为苔原—亚寒带针叶林鸟类。矮胖、不惧生。极耐寒，多栖于林线以上。