The Call of the Wild

John uses his winnings to pay off outstanding debts. With what’s leftover, their team can journey East in search of abandoned mines and a lost cabin, rumored to be full of valuables. The team knows other men and dogs as skilled as them have not survived the journey to the mines, but they set out with confidence. They traverse a wide range of terrain, and the seasons pass. The team doesn’t find the mines or lost cabin, but they find a stream rich with gold dust. The men gather the gold, and Buck feels the pull of a wilder, older time. He searches for the source of the call during the day but finds nothing. The call rings out at night, and it startles Buck awake. He follows the noise and finds a lone timber wolf. Buck and the wolf chase each other, but not with hostility. They run through the forest together, an act that satisfies Buck’s dormant urge to embrace his wild side: “Buck was wildly glad. He knew he was at last answering the call, running by the side of his wood brother toward the place from where the call surely came” (41).