oot in
the snow. It was an exceedingly large print; such as is made by a
careless white man who buys the first badly-made skin-boots offered to
him by a native seamstress. The college boy could not have made that
track. His skin-boots had been made by some Eskimo woman of no mean
ability. She had fitted them to his high-arched and shapely feet, as
she might have done had he been her Eskimo husband.

"Oh, well," she exclaimed, as she raced to join her companions,
"probably some native who has passed this way."

Even as she said it, she doubted her own judgment. She had never in
her life seen a native wear such a clumsy and badly-shaped skin-boot.

CHAPTER VIII

THE VISIT TO THE CHUKCHES

It was with a feeling of strange misgiving that Marian found herself on
the evening of the day they left the wreck entering the native village
of East Cape. Questions continually presented themselves to her mind.
What of the bearded stranger? Was he the miner who had demanded the
blue envelope? If it were he; if he appeared and once more demanded
the letter, what should she say? For any proof ever presented to her,
he might be the rightful owner, the real Phi Beta Ki. What could she
say to him? And the natives? Had they heard of the misfortunes of the
people of Whaling? Would they, too, allow superstitious fear to
overcome them? Would they drive the white girls from their midst?

This last problem did not trouble her greatly, however. They would
find a guide at once and begin their great adventure of crossing from
the Old World to the New on the ice-floe.

An interpreter was not hard to find. Many of the men had sailed on
American whalers. They were told by one of these that there was but
one man in all the village who ever attempted the dangerous passage of
Bering Straits. His name was O-bo-gok.

O-bo-gok was found sitting cross-legged on the sloping floor of his
skin-igloo, adjusting a new point to his harpoon.

"You tell him," said the smiling college boy, "that we want to go to
Cape Prince of Wales. Can he go tomorrow?"

The interpreter threw up his hands in surprise, but eventually
delivered his message.

The guide, a swarthy fellow, with shaggy, drooping moustache and a
powerful frame, did not look up from his work. He merely grunted.

"He say, that one, no can do," smiled the interpreter.

The college boy was not disturbed. He jingled something in his hand.
Marian, who stood beside him, s