CHAPTER III

THE OUTCAST

Lip-lip continued so to darken his days that White Fang became wickeder

and more ferocious than it was his natural right to be. Savageness was

a part of his make-up, but the savageness thus developed exceeded his

make-up. He acquired a reputation for wickedness amongst the

man-animals themselves. Wherever there was trouble and uproar in camp,

fighting and squabbling or the outcry of a squaw over a bit of stolen

meat, they were sure to find White Fang mixed up in it and usually at

the bottom of it. They did not bother to look after the causes of his

conduct. They saw only the effects, and the effects were bad. He was a

sneak and a thief, a mischief-maker, a fomenter of trouble; and irate

squaws told him to his face, the while he eyed them alert and ready to

dodge any quick-flung missile, that he was a wolf and worthless and

bound to come to an evil end.

He found himself an outcast in the midst of the populous camp. All the

young dogs followed Lip-lip’s lead. There was a difference between

White Fang and them. Perhaps they sensed his wild-wood breed, and

instinctively felt for him the enmity that the domestic dog feels for

the wolf. But be that as it may, they joined with Lip-lip in the

persecution. And, once declared against him, they found good reason to

continue declared against him. One and all, from time to time, they

felt his teeth; and to his credit, he gave more than he received. Many

of them he could whip in single fight; but single fight was denied him.

The beginning of such a fight was a signal for all the young dogs in

camp to come running and pitch upon him.

Out of this pack-persecution he learned two important things: how to

take care of himself in a mass-fight against him—and how, on a single

dog, to inflict the greatest amount of damage in the briefest space of

time. To keep one’s feet in the midst of the hostile mass meant life,

and this he learnt well. He became cat-like in his ability to stay on

his feet. Even grown dogs might hurtle him backward or sideways with

the impact of their heavy bodies; and backward or sideways he would go,

in the air or sliding on the ground, but always with his legs under him

and his feet downward to the mother earth.

When dogs fight, there are usually preliminaries to the actual

combat—snarlings and bristlings and stiff-legged struttings. But White

Fang learned to omit these preliminaries. Delay meant the coming

against him of all the young dogs. He must do his work quickly and get

away. So he learnt to give no warning of his intention. He rushed in

and snapped and slashed on the instant, without notice, before his foe

could prepare to meet him. Thus he learned how to inflict quick and

severe damage. Also he learned the value of surprise. A dog, taken off

its guard, its shoulder slashed open or its ear ripped in ribbons

before it knew what was happening, was a dog half whipped.

Furthermore, it was remarkably easy to overthrow a dog taken by

surprise; while a dog, thus overthrown, invariably exposed for a moment

the soft underside of its neck—the vulnerable point at which to strike

for its life. White Fang knew this point. It was a knowledge bequeathed

to him directly from the hunting generation of wolves. So it was that

White Fang’s method when he took the offensive, was: first to find a

young dog alone; second, to surprise it and knock it off its feet; and

third, to drive in with his teeth at the soft throat.

Being but partly grown his jaws had not yet become large enough nor

strong enough to make his throat-attack deadly; but many a young dog

went around camp with a lacerated throat in token of White Fang’s

intention. And one day, catching one of his enemies alone on the edge

of the woods, he managed, by repeatedly overthrowing him and attacking

the throat, to cut the great vein and let out the life. There was a

great row that night. He had been observed, the news had been carried

to the dead dog’s master, the squaws remembered all the instances of

stolen meat, and Grey Beaver was beset by many angry voices. But he

resolutely held the door of his tepee, inside which he had placed the

culprit, and refused to permit the vengeance for which his tribespeople

clamoured.

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. He was greeted with snarls by

his kind, with curses and stones by his gods. He lived tensely. He was

always keyed up, alert for attack, wary of being attacked, with an eye

for sudden and unexpected missiles, prepared to act precipitately and

coolly, to leap in with a flash of teeth, or to leap away with a

menacing snarl.

As for snarling he could snarl more terribly than any dog, young or

old, in camp. The intent of the snarl is to warn or frighten, and

judgment is required to know when it should be used. White Fang knew

how to make it and when to make it. Into his snarl he incorporated all

that was vicious, malignant, and horrible. With nose serrulated by

continuous spasms, hair bristling in recurrent waves, tongue whipping

out like a red snake and whipping back again, ears flattened down, eyes

gleaming hatred, lips wrinkled back, and fangs exposed and dripping, he

could compel a pause on the part of almost any assailant. A temporary

pause, when taken off his guard, gave him the vital moment in which to

think and determine his action. But often a pause so gained lengthened

out until it evolved into a complete cessation from the attack. And

before more than one of the grown dogs White Fang’s snarl enabled him

to beat an honourable retreat.

An outcast himself from the pack of the part-grown dogs, his sanguinary

methods and remarkable efficiency made the pack pay for its persecution

of him. Not permitted himself to run with the pack, the curious state

of affairs obtained that no member of the pack could run outside the

pack. White Fang would not permit it. What of his bushwhacking and

waylaying tactics, the young dogs were afraid to run by themselves.

With the exception of Lip-lip, they were compelled to hunch together

for mutual protection against the terrible enemy they had made. A puppy

alone by the river bank meant a puppy dead or a puppy that aroused the

camp with its shrill pain and terror as it fled back from the wolf-cub

that had waylaid it.

But White Fang’s reprisals did not cease, even when the young dogs had

learned thoroughly that they must stay together. He attacked them when

he caught them alone, and they attacked him when they were bunched. The

sight of him was sufficient to start them rushing after him, at which

times his swiftness usually carried him into safety. But woe the dog

that outran his fellows in such pursuit! White Fang had learned to turn

suddenly upon the pursuer that was ahead of the pack and thoroughly to

rip him up before the pack could arrive. This occurred with great

frequency, for, once in full cry, the dogs were prone to forget

themselves in the excitement of the chase, while White Fang never

forgot himself. Stealing backward glances as he ran, he was always

ready to whirl around and down the overzealous pursuer that outran his

fellows.

Young dogs are bound to play, and out of the exigencies of the

situation they realised their play in this mimic warfare. Thus it was

that the hunt of White Fang became their chief game—a deadly game,

withal, and at all times a serious game. He, on the other hand, being

the fastest-footed, was unafraid to venture anywhere. During the period

that he waited vainly for his mother to come back, he led the pack many

a wild chase through the adjacent woods. But the pack invariably lost

him. Its noise and outcry 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. Further he was more

directly connected with the Wild than they; and he knew more of its

secrets and stratagems. A favourite trick of his was to lose his trail

in running water and then lie quietly in a near-by thicket while their

baffled cries arose around him.

Hated by his kind and by mankind, indomitable, perpetually warred upon

and himself waging perpetual war, his development was rapid and

one-sided. This was no soil for kindliness and affection to blossom in.

Of such things he had not the faintest glimmering. 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. In order to face the constant danger of

hurt and even of destruction, his predatory and protective faculties

were unduly developed. He became quicker of movement than the other

dogs, swifter of foot, craftier, deadlier, more lithe, more lean with

ironlike muscle and sinew, more enduring, more cruel, more ferocious,

and more intelligent. He had to become all these things, else he would

not have held his own nor survive the hostile environment in which he

found himself.