As the mad riot swept past him and out of doors, he signalled to the
slaves, and the four tottering old men supported him on his feet as he
met the returning revellers, upright, glass in hand, pledging them a
toast to the short night when a man sleeps warm.

It did not take long to settle the estate of Klakee-Nah. Tommy, the
little Englishman, clerk at the trading post, was called in by El-Soo to
help. There was nothing but debts, notes overdue, mortgaged properties,
and properties mortgaged but worthless. Notes and mortgages were held by
Porportuk. Tommy called him a robber many times as he pondered the
compounding of the interest.

"Is it a debt, Tommy?" El-Soo asked.

"It is a robbery," Tommy answered.

"Nevertheless, it is a debt," she persisted.

The winter wore away, and the early spring, and still the claims of
Porportuk remained unpaid. He saw El-Soo often and explained to her at
length, as he had explained to her father, the way the debt could be
cancelled. Also, he brought with him old medicine-men, who elaborated to
her the everlasting damnation of her father if the debt were not paid.
One day, after such an elaboration, El-Soo made final announcement to
Porportuk.

"I shall tell you two things," she said. "First I shall not be your
wife. Will you remember that? Second, you shall be paid the last cent
of the sixteen thousand dollars--"

"Fifteen thousand nine hundred and sixty-seven dollars and seventy-five
cents," Porportuk corrected.

"My father said sixteen thousand," was her reply. "You shall be paid."

"How?"

"I know not how, but I shall find out how. Now go, and bother me no
more. If you do"--she hesitated to find fitting penalty--"if you do, I
shall have you rolled in the snow again as soon as the first snow flies."

This was still in the early spring, and a little later El-Soo surprised
the country. Word went up and down the Yukon from Chilcoot to the Delta,
and was carried from camp to camp to the farthermost camps, that in June,
when the first salmon ran, El-Soo, daughter of Klakee-Nah, would sell
herself at public auction to satisfy the claims of Porportuk. Vain were
the attempts to dissuade her. The missionary at St. George wrestled with
her, but she replied--

"Only the debts to God are settled in the next world. The debts of men
are of this world, and in this world are they settled."

Akoon wrestled with her, but she replied, "I do love thee, Akoon; but
honou