The Daily Alaska empire., 1933-11-25
Chapter 12
THE OLD FORT

THE OLD FORT
 WHILE the cossacks were drink
 W ing heavily" said Sonya. "the eighty surviving Klosohees massa- cred them all, burned their bodies in one huge pyre; and their old shaman laid the dread Thunder Curse on the place. Only the priest was left alive.
 Tt was a summer night like to- night" Sonya added. Flight men who escaped the first rush, barri- caded themselves in one of the rooms, but the Klosohees chopped the door off it's hinges and killed them. l imagined I could still see the dark stains on the walls of that room"
 Curt thought that the Indians he had seen on the landing that after noon were pretty mild set to be descendants of tn fiery tribe who had battled the Cossacks to a stand still, returning massacre for extor- tion. They've certainly come down notch" he remarked. They're as peaceful as coast Siwash now"
 "Oh, you're mistaken; the Indians around here aren't Klosohees," she corrected him. They're descendants of another band that used to live down toward Tellacet. The Kloso- hees fled back into the mountains after that massacre, and they've stayed there ever since. They're an almost unknown band They live up north in the Lilluar headwaters. and keep themselves isolated from other tribes, and they won't let white peo- pie come into their territory at all"
 Curt recalled a time when he had sat on the pier at Fort McMurray with Inspector Jamieson of the In- dian Bureau, and Jamieson had told him about a Host" tribe in the Lil- luar Mountains. These Klosohees might be the tribe Jamieson meant.
 According to Jamieson's account they were wild and unapproach- able clan, but not treacherous like the nomads of the Sikanni and Ma hanni countries. He had so far per suaded the Indian Bureau to let them alone because they minded their own business and clutched their freedom so pathetically.
 Gliding ashore, he beached the breeds canoe and started up the path with his companion. A he watched her moccasins play In and out of the yellow circle of light that he directed at the trail, he thought what small things they were smaller even than Regina Du- charme's.
 Once when her head bobbed close to his he caught the faint odor Of thyme perfume, and 1t put him in mind of the thyme-scented kerchief which had unlocked that Spanish consul case for him in Montreal. But what a difference between that soft palid woman and this clean-limbed vital girl at his side!
 The touch of her hand on his arm, as he guided her past root-snags and shielded her from brush Tipping back, was an experience such as he had never known with Rosalie Mar. lin. Although he had been acquaint- ed with her so short time, he felt the impact of her personality, very positive and cogent forcR
 THE fort loomed up just ahead. l Startlingly near, the owl sounded it's weird call again. Curt reached down for a stone anf sent it chatter ing against the old building. A soft winged shadow passed over them and they heard the angry clicking of the birds bill.
 At the door he Tipped the light on the massive rocl; walls and the broad parapet twenty-five feet high where soldiers once paced sentry-go at night. A clump of devils club nearly choked the. entrance. He pushed a way through the clump. and they stepped into the gloomy hallway that led d ,wn the center.
 There were six rooms on the ground floor. but the second story was one big room, probably the Cos sacks assembly place. The roof had partly fallen in; the floor above had routed, leaving only the thick beams: the dust of many generations GOV cred everything; but otherwise the ruin lay there as it had been left on the night of the massacre. one hundred and twenty years ago.
 Down the dusty hallway led a fresh moccasin track, small and dainty. Curt knew it was Sonya's. lon some previous expedition. She certainly had nerve, to visit that Ai~aA aioraf