of the story? You never know, it might just be an accident.”

Jenna rolled her eyes scornfully, “I’m sure Kodi has another story. It will probably go along the lines of something like ’I didn’t say that.’”

“Well you never know.” Star threw in. “Maybe it would be good to get his side of the story.”

Jenna growled when she remembered the promises that she couldn’t go talk to Kodi.

“Well, err, um … maybe it isn’t a good idea to, you know, get Kodi’s story. Huh, Huh.” Star retracted his answer timidly after Jenna growled so angrily.

“No Star. I’m not growling at you. It’s another one of Dusty’s promises. I can’t go and talk to Kodi about it.”

“Just you?” Dixie asked.

Jenna winked at both Star and Dixie. “Yeah, just me. But Dusty never said I couldn’t get Balto to go and talk to Kodi.”

Dixie and Star both grinned.

“So when are you going to go get Balto to talk to Kodi?” Dixie said.

“I’m probably going to go talk to Balto tomorrow after the mail team leaves. That way at least I’ll have time to think about what to say to Balto, and Balto will have time to think about what he’s going to say to Kodi.” Jenna said matter-of-factly.

“Say Jenna.” Star spoke up. “Where is Balto? I haven’t seen him since the cold settled in.”

Jenna rolled her eyes. “Don’t get me started on another problem. He’s currently hibernating for an indefinite amount of time. Someone should go out there and shake his lazy bones.”

“Where?” Star asked.

“Out on his boat of course. I don’t see how he can stand that cold. I mean just walking over here nearly killed me.” Jenna joked to lighten the mood. “But come on. Let’s forget this problem and get on to your pups.”

Stars puffed his chest out and raised his head high to show that proud father look. Dixie grinned and they all looked at the pups. “Well here they are.” Dixie said not really knowing what to say beyond the simple introduction.

Jenna looked closely at the pups. The five of them looked peaceful and completely innocent of anything. Jenna had a flash of her pups when they were that young.Why couldn’t they just be like that forever? There were two light silvery looking ones with dark faces and floppy ears. While the other three had the flat plane colors like Star with stripes down their backs and ridged ears like Dixie’s “So who are the boys, and who are the girls?”

Dixie put her paw carefully on the back of each of the three who looked alike with the ridged ears. “Well these three are girls -”

Star put his paw on the other two with floppy ears. “-And these two are boys.” Star and Dixie grinned at each other very romantically. Jenna felt slightly awkward for being there when the look of romance ran across both of their faces. I wish Balto was here with me so I didn’t feel like a third party.

“So what are their names?” Jenna said to cut the mood.

Both Dixie and Star looked at Jenna as if they were completely shocked to have her in their company.

“Well, err-” Star stumbled.

Dixie stepped in to rescue her mate. “We haven’t named them quite yet. We’re going to wait until they’re a little bit older and have a personality so the name fits them.”

“Ahh,” Jenna shook her head comprehending the thought process to their plan. “That sounds like a good idea. Balto and I just had some nice sounding names to give our boys and girls. Fortunately they grew into the names we gave them.” Jenna smiled and received the same smiles back.

A long quiet moment filled the little shed with the one frosted window and personal heater for Dixie and her puppies. “Well. I better get going and let you two tend to your pups.” Jenna stood up on her warmer slender legs. “I got to go and start thinking about what I got to do with my pups.”

“Well okay Jenna. I wish you could stay longer, but.” Dixie looked at her brood. “Family calls.”

Jenna grinned at Dixie and walked towards the shed door. Around the inside handle hung a red rag that served to open the door for dogs trying to get out. Jenna grasped the rag in her teeth and pulled lightly at the door. It swung open with jingling and jangling before Jenna stepped out.

With a whirl she turned back around and stuck her head in through the slightly ajar door. Star had lowered his shoulder and head and was sticking his nose down next to one of his pups hidden to Jenna by the edge of the basket they lay in. “Oh yeah Star. They look good.” Star raised his head and grinned stupidly. He looked as though he had been given praise off guard and didn't really know how to respond.

“Thanks.” He muttered

“Now could you close the door before the chill gets in?” Jenna grinned.

“Sure.” Star came to his feet and walked towards the door. With a shove of his shoulder the door shut and jingled.

Jenna stood for a moment looking at the door thinking about how her pups had been when they were young. They had been nothing more than defenseless little bundles of joy suckling at her belly in the shed behind her master’s house. She grinned as a thought came across her mind. I’ll have to see if Balto would like to have some more pups. Then at a quickened pace, Jenna made her way back to her master’s home to think about what she would tell Balto tomorrow after the team left.

3. The Alaska 500

The day wore on with little else happening anywhere in, or around the town. When the grey light in the sky settled down into a inky blackness, night began to take it’s rule; and with the night came the gentle wind, and stifling snow that would come as a surprise to some in the morning. The only good in the night came in the form of lights above the clouds that gave the entire land, from the mountains north of Nome, down to the end of the pack ice some two hundred miles to the south, a hue of red that gradually changed to blue, then green, and finally back to red again.

As the night settled around Nome, lanterns were lit inside homes to eek their light out onto the streets through frosty windows. For the most part they provided much of the light needed in the streets of Nome, though the northern lights gave off enough light to navigate a dark street. Nevertheless a lone scraggly man came around the town through the darkness, dressed to the teeth to bare the cold. In his gloves he pulled a sled full of lit lanterns. On every corner the lone man would stop, take a lantern from his sled, and hang it high on a hook on top of a metal pole with the aid of a long stick that he pulled in the sled. In the morning he would return and remove the empty lanterns to refill and hang up again in the night.

As the lone man passed down the dark street with his sled in tow, aiming his body for the end of the street where another pole stood without a lantern, a meeting was being conducted in a squat log cabin that had wisps of smoke coming out of the chimney. The cabin was old and had parts of it repaired at different times of different years as needed. A new log stuck out here, an old one that would soon need to be replaced here. The roof had been rebuilt during the previous summer when the mayor decided to put his own money into it. The politicians down in the lower forty-eight didn’t see the need to send five hundred dollars up to repair a leaking building that wasn’t even in their own territory.

Inside the building a wide stove that could easily heat the whole cabin burned at the front near the door and the street. A large pile of wood sat next to it on a steel stand that held half a cord of wood; enough for an entire month. For the most part the room was empty. Only empty chairs filled the room in a semi-organized fashion by a person who had no care as to how they looked. He knew he would have to pick them up tomorrow, so what did it matter how they were arranged.

Only three people came to the meeting besides the Mayor and the Telegraph Operator; only two of them to voice their concerns and worries. One was Mr. Scads, an old man who had come to Nome on the very first steamer and had helped put up the cabin he stood in. The other was Mrs. Tussle who worked everyday in the church on one thing or another for long hours of the day. Behind her sat her husband with his arms crossed watching everybody without a hint of enthusiasm. The only reason he was here was because his wife forced him. Behind the desk Mayor George Neil, a portly fellow who enjoyed chewing cigars down instead of smoking them, leaned back in his personal rocking chair taking everything in. Next to him stood the Telegraph Operator like a beat-down slave ready to do any bidding his master commanded. A lantern on the desk illuminated them all, along with three lanterns strung down the center of the cabin in equal distances. The meeting had been going on for some time already.

Mrs. Tussle leaned forward over the desk with her thin hands stretched out in front of her. “What can we do? I mean, the cold is the cause of this, and there’s nothing that we can do about the cold unless you can change the weather. What we nee-”

Mr. Scads removed his hand from under his beard where he had been resting it and set it on the edge of the cherry wood desk. “-We’re not here to decide what we can’t change. We know we can’t change the weather or how cold it is. I mean Nome has always been cold in the winter. Truthfully I don’t think there’s much of a problem. Ten years ago when we had no sheriff and the cold settled in for two weeks, half the town burned and three hundred people died. Of course it was mostly tents and men then, but I mean it’s just a little cold. It can’t stay forever, right?” He chuckled halfheartedly.

Mrs. Tussle looked right at Mr. Scads. “Mr. Scads. This has nothing to do with what happened ten years ago when this was a godless providence. This is about now. We are a civilized people who are ripping ourselves apart at home. Men are yelling at women and children, women are yelling at men and children, and