thing to go through with!'" he thought. "'Horrible alternatives!'
'Never so bad as your imagination pictures!' What strange phrases for a
woman to use who is going to rejoin her husband!"

When they embarked after the second spell Clare asked if she might sit
facing forward in the dug-out, so she could see better where they were
going. But Stonor guessed this was merely an excuse to escape from
having his solicitous eyes on her face.

* * * * *

Next morning they overtook the last Kakisa that they were to see on the
way down. He was drifting along close to the shore, and behind him in
his canoe sat his little boy as still as a mouse, receiving his
education in hunter's lore. This man was a more intelligent specimen
than they had met hitherto. He was a comely little fellow with an
extraordinary head of hair cut _a la_ Buster Brown, and his name, he
said, was Etzooah. Stonor remembered having heard of him and his hair as
far away as Fort Enterprise. His manners were good. While naturally
astonished at their appearance, he did not on that account lose his
self-possession. They conversed politely while drifting down side by
side.

Etzooah, in sharp contrast to all the other Kakisas, appeared to see
nothing out of the way in their wish to visit the White Medicine Man,
nor did he try to dissuade them.

"How far is it to the Great Falls?" asked Stonor.

"One sleep."

"Are the rapids too bad for a boat?"

"Rapids bad, but not too bad. I go down in my bark-canoe, I guess you go
all right in dug-out. Long tam ago my fat'er tell me all the Kakisa
people go to the Big Falls ev'ry year at the time when the berries ripe.
By the Big Falls they meet the people from Great Buffalo Lake and make
big talk there and make dance to do honour to the Old Man under the
falls. And this people trade leather for fur with the people from Great
Buffalo Lake. But now this people is scare to go there. But I am not
scare. I go there. Three times I go there. Each time I leave a little
present of tobacco for the Old Man so he know my heart is good towards
him. I guess Old Man like a brave man better than a woman. No harm come
to me since I go. My wife, my children got plenty to eat; I catch good
fur. Bam-bye I take my boy there too. Some men say I crazy for that, but
I say no. It is a fine sight. It make a man's heart big to see that
sight."

This was a man after Stonor's own heart. "Tell him those are good
words