nswered simply.

Tom looked round the room, and again there came to him the sense of
home. Logs roared and snapped in the great fireplace. The table, set
with the dishes and the plated silver McRae had imported from the
States, stirred in him a pleasure that was almost poignant. The books,
the organ, the quaint old engravings Angus had brought with him when
he crossed the ocean: all of these touched the trader nearly. He was
in exile, living a bachelor life under the most primitive conditions.
The atmosphere of this house penetrated to every fiber of his being.
It filled him with an acute hunger. Here were love and friendly
intercourse and all the daily, homely routine that made life
beautiful.

And here was the girl that he loved, vivid, vital, full of charm. The
swift deftness and grace of her movements enticed him. The inflections
of her warm, young voice set his pulses throbbing as music sometimes
did. An ardent desire of her flooded him. She was the most winsome
creature under heaven--but she was not for him.

Matapi-Koma sat at the head of the table, a smiling and benignant
matron finished in copper. She had on her best dress, a beaded
silk with purple satin trimmings, brought by a Red River cart from
Winnipeg, accompanied with a guarantee from the trader that Queen
Victoria had none better. The guarantee was worth what it was worth,
but Matapi-Koma was satisfied. Never had she seen anything so grand.
That Angus McRae could afford to buy it for her proved him a great
chief.

Jessie waited on the table herself. She set upon it such a dinner as
neither of her guests had eaten in years. Venison broiled to a turn,
juicy, succulent mallard ducks from the cold storage of their larder,
mashed potatoes with gravy, young boiled onions from Whoop-Up,
home-made rubaboo of delicious flavor, hot biscuits and
wild-strawberry jam! And finally, with the tea, a brandy-flavored plum
pudding that an old English lady at Winnipeg had taught Jessie how to
make.

Onistah ate lying on the couch. Afterward, filled to repletion, with
the sense of perfect contentment a good dinner brings, the two young
men stuffed their pipes and puffed strata of smoke toward the log
rafters of the room. Jessie cleared the table, then sat down and
put the last stitches in the gun-case she had been working at
intermittently for a month. It was finished, but she had not till now
stitched the initials into the cloth.

As the swift fingers of the girl