rusty, though. No. Mind like a steel
trap, that man. Curious sort of individual. You ought to see the books
he's got. Amazing. Science, philosophy, the poets--all sorts. Don't try
arguing theology with him unless you're quite advanced. Of course, I
know the church is adapting itself to modern thought, in a way. But
he'll tie you in a bowknot if you hold to the old theological doctrines.
Fact. Carr's scholarly sort, but awfully radical. Awfully."

"It's queer," said Thompson, "why a man like that should bury himself
here so long. Is it a fact that he is married to a native woman? His
daughter now--one wouldn't imagine her--"

"No fear," Tommy Ashe interrupted. "Carr's got an Indian woman, right
enough. They've got three mixed-blood youngsters. But his daughter--"

He gave Thompson a quick sidelong glance.

"Sophie's pure blood," said he. "She's a thorough-bred."

He said it almost challengingly.

CHAPTER VI

CERTAIN PERPLEXITIES

From the direction of the slough two shots sounded, presently followed
by two more. Then the gleeful yipping of Tommy's Ashe's retriever, and
Tommy's stentorian encouragement:

"That's the boy. Fetch him."

Close upon this Mr. Thompson's up-pricked ear detected another voice,
one that immediately set up in him an involuntary eagerness of
listening, a clear, liquid voice that called:

"Oh, Tommy, there's another wounded one, swimming away. Quick!"

Pow! Tommy's twelve-gauge cracked again. The two voices called
laughingly back and forth across the slough, mingled with the excited
barking of the brown dog as he retrieved the slaughtered ducks. After a
time silence fell. Thompson's nose detected an odor. He turned hastily
to his stove. But he had listened too long. The biscuits in his oven
were smoking.

That did not matter greatly in itself. It was merely one of a long
procession of culinary disasters. He could not, somehow, contrive to
prepare food in the simple manner of Mike Breyette's instructions. If
the biscuits had not scorched probably they would have been hopelessly
soggy, dismal things compared to the brown discs Mike had turned out of
the same oven. One was as bad as the other. Nothing seemed to work out
right. Nothing ever tasted right. Only a healthy hunger enabled him to
swallow the unsavory messes he concocted in the name of food.

He had been at Lone Moose two weeks now. His real work, his essential
labor in that untilled field, was no farther advanced. He m