ting the last of sixty hackamores, as he dreamed of the great north
trail, of open meadows by the Hagwilgaet, of the heaven-piercing spire
of Tsegeordinlth at the Forks of Skeena.

"Mother," he said, "I'm no slouch of a cargador. Them red gin cases is
still to rig for kitchen boxes, and it's all complete. The mules is
fattening good, I hear, and the men's the same as last summer, all worth
their feed, too."

But mother, grim and fierce in the throes of her spring cleaning, had
not come to admire. "Pete," she shrilled, "two more buckets of water,
and yew jest git a move on. And how long hev yew bin promisin' to
whittle me them clothes-pins? Now jest yew hustle, Pete, or I'll get
right ugly."

Pete only cut from the plug into his palm, and rolled the tobacco small
for his corn-cob pipe. His winter servitude was ended, and he was
master, the cargador before whom all men bow in the dread northlands.
Mother went off content to carry her own water, and Pete, with something
of a flourish, lighted his pipe.

"Mother!" Pete let out a sharp call, and forgetting her business, mother
came quite humbly, as though to heel. "Yes, Pete?"

He pointed with his pipe at a distant horseman rounding the flank of the
hill.

"Brooke?" she whispered, both gnarled rheumatic hands clutched at her
heart.

"I reckon," said Pete cheerfully. "Thinks he's a circus procession. That
sorrel's clattering a loose near-hind shoe, and her mouth just bleeding
as he saws with that spade bit. He's a sure polecat. Trots down-hill,
too, and suffers in his tail. Incompetent, mother. Look at his feet!
He's bad as a stale salmon, rotten to the bones. Been drinking, too."

Brooke drew up and dismounted, leaving his rein on the horse's neck,
instead of dropping it to the ground. When Brooke moved to sit on an
_aparejo_, Pete ordered him to one of the kitchen boxes. "Not Bolt
hisself may sit on _my_ riggings," said the old gray cargador.

"I thought," said Brooke quite kindly, "that this harness was mine."

"A half-interest," said mother, "sure-ly."

"I fear," said Brooke, "you sort of misunderstood. Old Taylor did say
something about your usefulness as a working partner, and, of course, if
we hadn't canceled that preposterous contract with the Hudson's Bay
Company, there's no doubt your knowledge of the country up north would
have been worth paying for. It was, as you say, damned awkward about his
being blind as a bat; in fact, I was put to quite a lot of