ring cautiously in an
indirect, impersonal manner.

"Those your kids, too, eh?" Stark continued.

"Yes, and I got another one besides--older. A girl."

"She's a 'pip,' too," said "No Creek" Lee, fervently. "She's plumb
beautiful."

"All of them half-breeds?" questioned Stark.

"Sure." The trader's answer was short, and when the other showed no
intention of pressing the subject further he sauntered away; but no
sooner was he out of hearing than Stark said: "Humph! They're all
alike."

"Who?"

"Squaw-men."

"This one ain't," Lee declared. "He's different; ain't he, Lieutenant?"

"He certainly is," agreed Burrell. This was the first criticism he had
heard of Necia's father, and although Stark volunteered no argument, it
was plain that his opinion remained unaffected.

The old man went through the store at the rear and straightway sought
Alluna. Speaking to her with unwonted severity in the Pah-Ute language,
he said:

"I have told you never to use your native tongue before strangers. That
man in the store understands."

"I only asked for sugar to cook the berries with," she replied.

"True, but another time you might say more, therefore the less you
speak it the better. He is the kind who sees much and talks little.
Address me in Siwash or in English unless we are alone."

"I do not like that man," said the woman. "His eyes are bad, like a
fish eagle's, and he has no heart."

Suddenly she dropped her work and came close up to him. "Can he be the
one?"

"I don't know. Stark is not the name, but he might have changed it; he
had reasons enough."

"Who is this man Stark?"

"I don't know that, either. I used to hear of him when I was in British
Columbia."

"But surely you must know if he is the same--she must have told you how
he looked--others must have told you--"

Gale shook his head. "Very little. I could not ask her, and others knew
him so well they never doubted that I had seen him; but this much I do
know, he was dark--"

"This man is dark--"

"--and his spirit was like that of a mad horse--"

"This man's temper is black--"

"--and his eyes were cruel."

"This man has evil eyes."

"He lacked five years of my age," said the trader.

"This man is forty years old. It must be he," said the squaw.

Even Necia would have marvelled had she heard this revelation of her
father's age, for his hair and brows were grizzled, and his face had
the look of a man of sixty, while only those who knew