e so bad as you think. Sit
down and tell me all about it and I'll see what can be done."

Disregarding the proffered chair, the girl launched forth with the
story of her encounter with Swimming Wolf. Her slim hands gestured.
Above her flushed cheeks her eyes flashed and the unruly cloud of hair,
freed at last from its ribbon, fell about her shoulders.

As she told of the slap on Swimming Wolf's ear, the pale eyes of the
White Chief glowed. Truly, as Kayak Bill had said, one could never
tell about a white woman. Here was a situation he would have to handle
with care. Here was a time when his knowledge of Indian nature, gained
during years of association with them, stood him in good stead.

"Miss Jean," he said. "Just a moment. I think I can explain Swimming
Wolf's extraordinary action." The White Chief measured her with an air
of understanding that, he could see, made an impression on the girl in
spite of herself. "An Indian, you know, never really grows up. Even
though he has the body of a man, he still keeps the heart of a child.
Now when you were little, Miss Jean, don't you remember the time you
saw your first negro--a black, strange creature? Didn't you wonder,
while you looked at his face and his hands if he could possibly be
black all over? Be honest now, didn't you?"

Loll who had settled himself on the floor with an arm about Kobuk's
neck, sprang up and stood beside his aunt.

"Yes, _I_ did, Chief," he interrupted, with eager, nodding head, "and I
asked him about it, too. I did!"

Jean's face was clearing. She inclined her head in faint affirmation.

"Just so," the trader went on. "When Swimming Wolf saw his first white
woman no doubt in his simple heart he wondered, too, and so did the
other natives who gathered about you,--children, all of them. Swimming
Wolf, the clumsy siwash, had no English words to ask you about it, so
he took the simplest way to find out whether or not the white came off!"

A shadowy smile began to twitch at the corners of Jean's mouth. Seeing
it, the White Chief was encouraged to go on:

"The inquisitive rascal is really one of our bravest hunters, and a man
of tall totems and many blankets. He would feel astonished and
_kusk-i-a-tu_--very sad--if he knew he had offended you. As a matter
of fact,"--the trader laughed--"the Wolf admires you and in his
primitive way has paid you a great compliment. I wasn't going to
mention it, but since this has come up perhap