a weird and terrible account of us."

At that he raced along the cliff-top path and the next moment found
himself slipping and sliding down a zig-zagging trail which led down
the hillside.

He was halfway down before he caught the first glimpse of the village.
Beneath him lay some brown cubes which he knew to be boxlike upper
stories to the houses of the natives.

"That settles one thing," he murmured. "They're islanders. The
natives of Russia build their homes of poles, deerskin and walrus-skin,
tepee fashion; the American natives use logs and sod. Only islanders
build them of rocks."

For a moment his courage failed him. He was a boy on an island
somewhere in the Arctic, his only companion an old and harmless dog,
his only weapon a hunting knife; and he was about to enter a village
filled with natives.

"Perhaps," he said slowly, looking down into the trusting eyes of the
dog, "we had better wait. They may all be on a grand spree. And if
they are it won't be safe. Whatever they may be when they're sober,
they'll be dangerous enough when drunk."

But the peaceful quiet of the village, as it lay there some hundreds of
feet below, reassured him.

"Come on, old boy," he said at last, "we'll chance it."

CHAPTER XIX

MYSTERIES EXPLAINED

There was little time left to the girls for wondering after the fire
against the boarded-up house had been extinguished, for the entire
throng burst in upon them. This time, apparently as eager to welcome
them as they had been a few minutes before to destroy them, they rushed
up to grasp their hands and mumble:

"Me-con-a-muck! Il-e-con-a-muck!"

Soon they all filed out again, two of them bearing the boy with the
crushed foot.

Only one remained. He was a young Eskimo with a clean-cut intelligent
face. Lucile, by his posture, recognized the one who had championed
their cause from the first.

"Perhaps you wonder much?" he began. "Perhaps you ask how is this?
Sit down. I will say it to you."

The very sound of their own tongue, badly managed though it might be,
was music to the two worn out and nerve-wrecked girls. They sat down
on the sleeping-bag to listen, while the yellow light of the seal-oil
lamp flickered across the dark, expressive face of the Eskimo.

He bent over and drew imaginary circles on the floor, one small and one
large, just as the boy had done with charcoal.

"Here," he smiled, "one island. Here one. This island one house.
Here