the reader, were standing in the trading
store of Fort Enterprise, conversing earnestly with Black, the Indian,
who has been already mentioned at the beginning of our tale. The wife
of the latter--the White Swan--was busily engaged in counting over the
pack of furs that lay open on the counter, absorbed, apparently, in an
abstruse calculation as to how many yards of cloth and strings of beads
they would purchase.

"Well, I'm glad that's fixed, anyhow," said Robin to his wife, as he
turned to the Indian with a satisfied air, and addressed him in his
native tongue, "it's a bargain, then, that you an' Slugs go with me on
this expedition, is't so?"

"The Black Swan is ready," replied the Indian, quietly, "and he thinks
that Slugs will go too--but the white hunter is self-willed; he has a
mouth--ask himself."

"Ay, ye don't like to answer for him," said Robin, with a smile;
"assuredly Slugs has his own notions, and holds to 'em; but I'll ask
him. He is to be here this night, with a deer, I hope, for there are
many mouths to fill."

Black Swan, who was a tall, taciturn, and powerful Indian, here glanced
at his wife, who was, like most Indian women, a humble-looking and not
very pretty or clean creature. Turning again to Robin, he said, in a
low, soft voice--

"The White Swan is not strong, and she is not used to be alone."

"I understand you," said Robin; "she shall come to the Fort, and be
looked after. You won't object to take her in, Molly, when we're away?"

"Object, Robin," said Molly, with a smile, which was accompanied by a
sigh, "I'll only be too glad to have her company."

"Well, then, that's settled; and now, Black Swan, I may as well tell you
what coorse I mean to follow out in this sarch for my child'n. You know
already that four white men--strangers--have come to the Fort, an' are
now smokin' their pipes in the hall, but you don't know that one on 'em
is my own brother Jefferson; Jeff, I've bin used to call him. Jeff's
bin a harem-scarem feller all his life--active and able enough, an' good
natur'd too, but he never could stick to nothin', an' so he's bin
wanderin' about the world till grey hairs have begun to show on him,
without gettin' a home or a wife. The last thing he tried was stokin' a
steamboat on the Mississippi; but the boat blew up, pitched a lot o' the
passengers into the water, an' the rest o' them into the next world.
Jeff was always in luck with his life; he's lost everythin' over