Evening star., 1933-11-25

post; its very vicinity was Stunned like
a haunted place.
Paul started driving tent pegs. Curt
stepped inside and began examining
their duff1e to make sure he had over
looked no label or initiating which
might give them away to suspicious
prowler. While he was doing this he
heard Paul stop pounding and say
Bon soir" to some one. Glancing out
the fap.front he saw a girl go past,
carrying a fish rod, creel and canoe
He had only a neeting glimpse of
her but that glimpse made him
straighten up and stare. She was
wearing blue corduroy dress, laced
moccasins, tam and sweater blouse
with one elbow worn through.
Her hair was a brownish golden: she
walked along with a lance-hke erect
ness of body, and her face-he saw it
only in p-oflle-waS so beautiful and so
strange in its type Of beauty that he
kept staring through the fap-front for
moments after she had gone by.
When he finished and went outside
she was already out upon the lake in a
birchbark canoe. skirling toward clus-
ter of wooded islets half mile offshors.
Trouting he guessed. II she was any
thing of fisherman she ought to snag
some big ones in the shadows around
those Islands, but from the awkward
way she handled the paddle she was
plainly a tenderfoot
He turned to Paul, who was watching
her. too. Who is she? D'you know?''
"A stranger to me. to my regret"
Curt smiled at his rapt gaze. You
find her pretty. don't you? AS pretty
as ptite Regina Ducharme at Fort
Chipewyn?"
Almost"
"Humph! That's a big admission
from you!"
The girl disappeared among the
islands. Curt went on with the camp
work. Bending down a nearby sapling
he tied their grub pack to the top of
1t and tipped the sappling up again,
safely caching the supplies from stray
huskies.
He stepped back into the timber to
find dead birch for fuel. The tropical
luxuriance of the woods amazed him,
even though he had made trips up
Juneau way and knew the "drizzle
country" well. The pines and cedars
were lordly things, eight feet across the
stump and towering above 200.
The air was heavy with the odor of
Summer flowers banked in great heaps
IN the open spots. The moss under his
feet was like walking on three inches
of softest plush The whole woods was
dominated by moss 1t carpeted the
ground and windfall logs, ran over the
boulders and up the tree trunks and
hung In festoons from the branches.
I'm plain lucky" he thought CRATE
fully, TO be hunting Karakhan in a
country like this"
He pushed over a dead birch, dragged
1t back to camp and told Paul: "rd
better step out to the trading store now
and get the hang of things there so
that tonight we can put across the Job
we talked about. While I'm gone you
can be bringing our canoe from the
pier"
When he returned, half an hour
later. Paul was standing on the land
wash. The young Canadian beckcned
That girl over among those islands
is likely to experience trouble If we
don't go over there"
What's up?"
Paul told him. A few minutes after
the girl had padded in among the
Islands one of those half breeds had
come down the shore, furtively secured
canoe and slipped across the water on
her trail He was drunk, Paul added
Curt looked out at those low, dim
masses and swore in perplexity. If he
went over there and interfered he would
make an enemy of that half breed. and
IT was bad policy to have enemies at
Russian Lake. The girl should have
known better than to wander away at
twilight when irresponsible men were
loafing about the post.
But still, she was girl, alone out
On the rocky tip of an island, where
the waves Tapped close to her mocca-
sins, Sonya was having fine luck with
the butterfly lure which old John Pax
ton had made for her. In 40 minutes
she had caught IL trout. some of them
so big that their tails stuck out of her
Creel.
She was conscious of no danger.
Curt for,,osrov take~ h>. -,.r-