Chapter: "It's hopeless," Weedon Scott confessed.

He sat on the step of his cabin and stared at the dog-musher, who
responded with a shrug that was equally hopeless.

Together they looked at White Fang at the end of his stretched chain,
bristling, snarling, ferocious, straining to get at the sled-dogs.  Having
received sundry lessons from Matt, said lessons being imparted by means
of a club, the sled-dogs had learned to leave White Fang alone; and even
then they were lying down at a distance, apparently oblivious of his
existence.

"It's a wolf and there's no taming it," Weedon Scott announced.

"Oh, I don't know about that," Matt objected.  "Might be a lot of dog in
'm, for all you can tell.  But there's one thing I know sure, an' that
there's no gettin' away from."

The dog-musher paused and nodded his head confidentially at Moosehide
Mountain.

"Well, don't be a miser with what you know," Scott said sharply, after
waiting a suitable length of time.  "Spit it out.  What is it?"

The dog-musher indicated White Fang with a backward thrust of his thumb.

"Wolf or dog, it's all the same--he's ben tamed 'ready."

"No!"

"I tell you yes, an' broke to harness.  Look close there.  D'ye see them
marks across the chest?"

"You're right, Matt.  He was a sled-dog before Beauty Smith got hold of
him."

"And there's not much reason against his bein' a sled-dog again."

"What d'ye think?" Scott queried eagerly.  Then the hope died down as he
added, shaking his head, "We've had him two weeks now, and if anything
he's wilder than ever at the present moment."

"Give 'm a chance," Matt counselled.  "Turn 'm loose for a spell."

The other looked at him incredulously.

"Yes," Matt went on, "I know you've tried to, but you didn't take a
club."

"You try it then."

The dog-musher secured a club and went over to the chained animal.  White
Fang watched the club after the manner of a caged lion watching the whip
of its trainer.

"See 'm keep his eye on that club," Matt said.  "That's a good sign.  He's
no fool.  Don't dast tackle me so long as I got that club handy.  He's
not clean crazy, sure."

As the man's hand approached his neck, White Fang bristled and snarled
and crouched down.  But while he eyed the approaching hand, he at the
same time contrived to keep track of the club in the other hand,
suspended threateningly above him.  Matt unsnapped the chain from the
collar and stepped back.

White Fang could scarcely realise that he was free.  Many months had gone
by since he passed into the possession of Beauty Smith, and in all that
period he had never known a moment of freedom except at the times he had
been loosed to fight with other dogs.  Immediately after such fights he
had always been imprisoned again.

He did not know what to make of it.  Perhaps some new devilry of the gods
was about to be perpetrated on him.  He walked slowly and cautiously,
prepared to be assailed at any moment.  He did not know what to do, it
was all so unprecedented.  He took the precaution to sheer off from the
two watching gods, and walked carefully to the corner of the cabin.
Nothing happened.  He was plainly perplexed, and he came back again,
pausing a dozen feet away and regarding the two men intently.

"Won't he run away?" his new owner asked.

Matt shrugged his shoulders.  "Got to take a gamble.  Only way to find
out is to find out."

"Poor devil," Scott murmured pityingly.  "What he needs is some show of
human kindness," he added, turning and going into the cabin.

He came out with a piece of meat, which he tossed to White Fang.  He
sprang away from it, and from a distance studied it suspiciously.

"Hi-yu, Major!" Matt shouted warningly, but too late.

Major had made a spring for the meat.  At the instant his jaws closed on
it, White Fang struck him.  He was overthrown.  Matt rushed in, but
quicker than he was White Fang.  Major staggered to his feet, but the
blood spouting from his throat reddened the snow in a widening path.

"It's too bad, but it served him right," Scott said hastily.

But Matt's foot had already started on its way to kick White Fang.  There
was a leap, a flash of teeth, a sharp exclamation.  White Fang, snarling
fiercely, scrambled backward for several yards, while Matt stooped and
investigated his leg.

"He got me all right," he announced, pointing to the torn trousers and
undercloths, and the growing stain of red.

"I told you it was hopeless, Matt," Scott said in a discouraged voice.
"I've thought about it off and on, while not wanting to think of it.  But
we've come to it now.  It's the only thing to do."

As he talked, with reluctant movements he drew his revolver, threw open
the cylinder, and assured himself of its contents.

"Look here, Mr. Scott," Matt objected; "that dog's ben through hell.  You
can't expect 'm to come out a white an' shinin' angel.  Give 'm time."

"Look at Major," the other rejoined.

The dog-musher surveyed the stricken dog.  He had sunk down on the snow
in the circle of his blood and was plainly in the last gasp.

"Served 'm right.  You said so yourself, Mr. Scott.  He tried to take
White Fang's meat, an' he's dead-O.  That was to be expected.  I wouldn't
give two whoops in hell for a dog that wouldn't fight for his own meat."

"But look at yourself, Matt.  It's all right about the dogs, but we must
draw the line somewhere."

"Served me right," Matt argued stubbornly.  "What'd I want to kick 'm
for?  You said yourself that he'd done right.  Then I had no right to
kick 'm."

"It would be a mercy to kill him," Scott insisted.  "He's untamable."

"Now look here, Mr. Scott, give the poor devil a fightin' chance.  He
ain't had no chance yet.  He's just come through hell, an' this is the
first time he's ben loose.  Give 'm a fair chance, an' if he don't
deliver the goods, I'll kill 'm myself.  There!"

"God knows I don't want to kill him or have him killed," Scott answered,
putting away the revolver.  "We'll let him run loose and see what
kindness can do for him.  And here's a try at it."

He walked over to White Fang and began talking to him gently and
soothingly.

"Better have a club handy," Matt warned.

Scott shook his head and went on trying to win White Fang's confidence.

White Fang was suspicious.  Something was impending.  He had killed this
god's dog, bitten his companion god, and what else was to be expected
than some terrible punishment?  But in the face of it he was indomitable.
He bristled and showed his teeth, his eyes vigilant, his whole body wary
and prepared for anything.  The god had no club, so he suffered him to
approach quite near.  The god's hand had come out and was descending upon
his head.  White Fang shrank together and grew tense as he crouched under
it.  Here was danger, some treachery or something.  He knew the hands of
the gods, their proved mastery, their cunning to hurt.  Besides, there
was his old antipathy to being touched.  He snarled more menacingly,
crouched still lower, and still the hand descended.  He did not want to
bite the hand, and he endured the peril of it until his instinct surged
up in him, mastering him with its insatiable yearning for life.

Weedon Scott had believed that he was quick enough to avoid any snap or
slash.  But he had yet to learn the remarkable quickness of White Fang,
who struck with the certainty and swiftness of a coiled snake.

Scott cried out sharply with surprise, catching his torn hand and holding
it tightly in his other hand.  Matt uttered a great oath and sprang to
his side.  White Fang crouched down, and backed away, bristling, showing
his fangs, his eyes malignant with menace.  Now he could expect a beating
as fearful as any he had received from Beauty Smith.

"Here!  What are you doing?" Scott cried suddenly.

Matt had dashed into the cabin and come out with a rifle.

"Nothin'," he said slowly, with a careless calmness that was assumed,
"only goin' to keep that promise I made.  I reckon it's up to me to kill
'm as I said I'd do."

"No you don't!"

"Yes I do.  Watch me."

As Matt had pleaded for White Fang when he had been bitten, it was now
Weedon Scott's turn to plead.

"You said to give him a chance.  Well, give it to him.  We've only just
started, and we can't quit at the beginning.  It served me right, this
time.  And--look at him!"

White Fang, near the corner of the cabin and forty feet away, was
snarling with blood-curdling viciousness, not at Scott, but at the dog-
musher.

"Well, I'll be everlastingly gosh-swoggled!" was the dog-musher's
expression of astonishment.

"Look at the intelligence of him," Scott went on hastily.  "He knows the
meaning of firearms as well as you do.  He's got intelligence and we've
got to give that intelligence a chance.  Put up the gun."

"All right, I'm willin'," Matt agreed, leaning the rifle against the
woodpile.

"But will you look at that!" he exclaimed the next moment.

White Fang had quieted down and ceased snarling.  "This is worth
investigatin'.  Watch."

Matt, reached for the rifle, and at the same moment White Fang snarled.
He stepped away from the rifle, and White Fang's lifted lips descended,
covering his teeth.

"Now, just for fun."

Matt took the rifle and began slowly to raise it to his shoulder.  White
Fang's snarling began with the movement, and increased as the movement
approached its culmination.  But the moment before the rifle came to a
level on him, he leaped sidewise behind the corner of the cabin.  Matt
stood staring along the sights at the empty space of snow which had been
occupied by White Fang.

The dog-musher put the rifle down solemnly, then turned and looked at his
employer.

"I agree with you, Mr. Scott.  That dog's too intelligent to kill."

 Although Matt is able to recognize that White Fang has been domesticated previously, Weedon Scott is dubious that he will be able to tame the dog. When Scott attempts to throw a piece of meat to White Fang, the meat is intercepted by another of Scott's sled-dogs. That dog pays for it with his life as White Fang swiftly kills him. He also bites Matt's leg when Matt kicks him in rebuke. Scott thinks he should do White Fang a favor and put the beast out its misery by killing him, but Matt argues that it was the dog's own fault, and his, for interfering with this wild creature's feeding: "I wouldn't give two whoops in hell for a dog that wouldn't fight for his own meat." Scott gives White Fang a chance, and begins to pet him. White Fang fights the instinct to bite Scott's hand for as long as he can, but, at length, he must yield to it. This time, Matt moves to kill White Fang, but Scott intercedes. They notice that White Fang seems to understand the threat of the rifle and decide that he is too intelligent a beast to kill. They agree to give White Fang another chance.

