big
Colt's. And that dog sat down and looked at me. I tell you he didn't
plead. He just looked. And I saw all kinds of incomprehensible things
moving, yes, _moving,_ in those eyes of his. I didn't really see them
move; I thought I saw them, for, as I said before, I guess I only sensed
them. And I want to tell you right now that it got beyond me. It was
like killing a man, a conscious, brave man who looked calmly into your
gun as much as to say, "Who's afraid?" Then, too, the message seemed so
near that, instead of pulling the trigger quick, I stopped to see if I
could catch the message. There it was, right before me, glimmering all
around in those eyes of his. And then it was too late. I got scared. I
was trembly all over, and my stomach generated a nervous palpitation
that made me seasick. I just sat down and looked at that dog, and he
looked at me, till I thought I was going crazy. Do you want to know what
I did? I threw down the gun and ran back to camp with the fear of God in
my heart. Steve laughed at me. But I notice that Steve led Spot into the
woods, a week later, for the same purpose, and that Steve came back
alone, and a little later Spot drifted back, too.

At any rate, Spot wouldn't work. We paid a hundred and ten dollars for
him from the bottom of our sack, and he wouldn't work. He wouldn't even
tighten the traces. Steve spoke to him the first time we put him in
harness, and he sort of shivered, that was all. Not an ounce on the
traces. He just stood still and wobbled, like so much jelly. Steve
touched him with the whip. He yelped, but not an ounce. Steve touched
him again, a bit harder, and he howled--the regular long wolf howl. Then
Steve got mad and gave him half a dozen, and I came on the run from the
tent. I told Steve he was brutal with the animal, and we had some
words--the first we'd ever had. He threw the whip down in the snow, and
walked away mad. I picked it up and went to it. That Spot trembled and
wobbled and cowered before ever I swung the lash, and with the first
bite of it he howled like a lost soul. Next he lay down in the snow. I
started the rest of the dogs, and they dragged him along while I threw
the whip into him. He rolled over on his back and bumped along, his four
legs waving in the air, himself howling as though he was going through a
sausage machine. Steve came back and laughed at me, and I apologized for
what I'd said.

There was no getting any work out of that Spot; and to make