said no more. She would not mention the subject again probably.
But it would be a great deal in her thoughts. She lived much of the
time inside herself with her own imagination. This had the generosity
and the enthusiasm of youth. She wanted to believe people fine and
good and true. It warmed her to discover unexpected virtues in them.

Mid-afternoon brought them to Faraway. They drove down the main street
of the village to McRae's house while the half-breeds cheered from the
door of the Morse store.

Jessie burst into the big family room where Matapi-Koma sat bulging
out from the only rocking-chair in the North woods.

"Oh, Mother--Mother!" the girl cried, and hugged the Cree woman with
all the ardent young savagery of her nature.

The Indian woman's fat face crinkled to an expansive smile. She had
stalwart sons of her own, but no daughters except this adopted child.
Jessie was very dear to her.

In a dozen sentences the girl poured out her story, the words tumbling
pell-mell over each other in headlong haste.

Matapi-Koma waddled out to the sled. "Onistah stay here," she said,
and beamed on him. "Blackfoot all same Cree to Matapi-Koma when he
friend Jessie. Angus send word nurse him till he well again."

Tom carried the Indian into the house so that his feet would not touch
the ground. Jessie had stayed in to arrange the couch where Fergus
usually slept.

She followed Morse to the door when he left. "We'll have some things
to send back to Father when you go. I'll bring them down to the store
to-morrow morning," she said. "And Mother wants you to come to supper
to-night. Don't you dare say you're too busy."

He smiled at the intimate feminine fierceness of the injunction. The
last few hours had put them on a somewhat different footing. He would
accept such largesse as she was willing to offer. He recognized the
spirit in which it was given. She wanted to show her appreciation of
what he had done for her and was about to do for the man she loved.
Nor would Morse meet her generosity in a churlish spirit.

"I'll be here when the gong rings," he told her heartily.

"Let's see. It's nearly three now. Say five o'clock," she decided.

"At five I'll be knockin' on the door."

She flashed at him a glance both shy and daring. "And I'll open it
before you break through and bring it with you."

The trader went away with a queer warmth in his heart he had not known
for many a day. The facts did not justify this ela