te
and natural, and I said:

"It seems as though I have lived this life always. The world of books
and bookish folk is very vague, more like a dream memory than an
actuality. I surely have hunted and forayed and fought all the days of
my life. And you, too, seem a part of it. You are--" I was on the
verge of saying, "my woman, my mate," but glibly changed it to--"standing
the hardship well."

But her ear had caught the flaw. She recognized a flight that midmost
broke. She gave me a quick look.

"Not that. You were saying--?"

"That the American Mrs. Meynell was living the life of a savage and
living it quite successfully," I said easily.

"Oh," was all she replied; but I could have sworn there was a note of
disappointment in her voice.

But "my woman, my mate" kept ringing in my head for the rest of the day
and for many days. Yet never did it ring more loudly than that night, as
I watched her draw back the blanket of moss from the coals, blow up the
fire, and cook the evening meal. It must have been latent savagery
stirring in me, for the old words, so bound up with the roots of the
race, to grip me and thrill me. And grip and thrill they did, till I
fell asleep, murmuring them to myself over and over again.

CHAPTER XXXI

"It will smell," I said, "but it will keep in the heat and keep out the
rain and snow."

We were surveying the completed seal-skin roof.

"It is clumsy, but it will serve the purpose, and that is the main
thing," I went on, yearning for her praise.

And she clapped her hands and declared that she was hugely pleased.

"But it is dark in here," she said the next moment, her shoulders
shrinking with a little involuntary shiver.

"You might have suggested a window when the walls were going up," I said.
"It was for you, and you should have seen the need of a window."

"But I never do see the obvious, you know," she laughed back. "And
besides, you can knock a hole in the wall at any time."

"Quite true; I had not thought of it," I replied, wagging my head sagely.
"But have you thought of ordering the window-glass? Just call up the
firm,--Red, 4451, I think it is,--and tell them what size and kind of
glass you wish."

"That means--" she began.

"No window."

It was a dark and evil-appearing thing, that hut, not fit for aught
better than swine in a civilized land; but for us, who had known the
misery of the open boat, it was a snug little habitation. Following the