No dog could make him lose his footing.
This was the favourite trick of the wolf breeds—to rush in upon him, either directly or with an unexpected swerve, in the hope of striking his shoulder and overthrowing him.
Mackenzie hounds, Eskimo and Labrador dogs, huskies and Malemutes—all tried it on him, and all failed.
He was never known to lose his footing.
Men told this to one another, and looked each time to see it happen; but White Fang always disappointed them.
Then there was his lightning quickness.
It gave him a tremendous advantage over his antagonists.
No matter what their fighting experience, they had never encountered a dog that moved so swiftly as he.
Also to be reckoned with, was the immediateness of his attack.
The average dog was accustomed to the preliminaries of snarling and bristling and growling, and the average dog was knocked off his feet and finished before he had begun to fight or recovered from his surprise.
So often did this happen, that it became the custom to hold White Fang until the other dog went through its preliminaries, was good and ready, and even made the first attack.
But greatest of all the advantages in White Fang’s favour, was his experience.
He knew more about fighting than did any of the dogs that faced him.
He had fought more fights, knew how to meet more tricks and methods, and had more tricks himself, while his own method was scarcely to be improved upon.
As the time went by, he had fewer and fewer fights.
Men despaired of matching him with an equal, and Beauty Smith was compelled to pit wolves against him.
These were trapped by the Indians for the purpose, and a fight between White Fang and a wolf was always sure to draw a crowd.
Once, a full-grown female lynx was secured, and this time White Fang fought for his life.
Her quickness matched his; her ferocity equalled his; while he fought with his fangs alone, and she fought with her sharp-clawed feet as well.
But after the lynx, all fighting ceased for White Fang.
There were no more animals with which to fight—at least, there was none considered worthy of fighting with him.
So he remained on exhibition until spring, when one Tim Keenan, a faro-dealer, arrived in the land.
With him came the first bull-dog that had ever entered the Klondike.
That this dog and White Fang should come together was inevitable, and for a week the anticipated fight was the mainspring of conversation in certain quarters of the town.
CHAPTER IV—THE CLINGING DEATH
Beauty Smith slipped the chain from his neck and stepped back.
For once White Fang did not make an immediate attack.
He stood still, ears pricked forward, alert and curious, surveying the strange animal that faced him.
He had never seen such a dog before.
Tim Keenan shoved the bull-dog forward with a muttered
“Go to it.”
The animal waddled toward the centre of the circle, short and squat and ungainly. He came to a stop and blinked across at White Fang.
There were cries from the crowd of,
“Go to him, Cherokee!
Sick ’m, Cherokee!
Eat ’m up!”
But Cherokee did not seem anxious to fight.
He turned his head and blinked at the men who shouted, at the same time wagging his stump of a tail good-naturedly.
He was not afraid, but merely lazy.
Besides, it did not seem to him that it was intended he should fight with the dog he saw before him.
He was not used to fighting with that kind of dog, and he was waiting for them to bring on the real dog.
Tim Keenan stepped in and bent over Cherokee, fondling him on both sides of the shoulders with hands that rubbed against the grain of the hair and that made slight, pushing-forward movements.
These were so many suggestions.
Also, their effect was irritating, for Cherokee began to growl, very softly, deep down in his throat.
There was a correspondence in rhythm between the growls and the movements of the man’s hands.
The growl rose in the throat with the culmination of each forward-pushing movement, and ebbed down to start up afresh with the beginning of the next movement.
The end of each movement was the accent of the rhythm, the movement ending abruptly and the growling rising with a jerk.
This was not without its effect on White Fang.
The hair began to rise on his neck and across the shoulders.
Tim Keenan gave a final shove forward and stepped back again.