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Indian or Esquimaux boys they seemed to be, who talked some jargon understanded of the Pymeut pilot. The Boy, lifting tired eyes, saw something white glimmering high in the air up on the right river bank. In this light it refused to form part of any conceivable plan, but hung there in the air detached, enigmatic, spectral.
The Boy plunged forward, caught the blow as it descended, and flung the arm aside, wrenched the girl free, and as Joe came on again, looking as if he meant business, the Boy planted a sounding lick on his jaw. The Pymeut staggered, and drew off a little way, looking angry enough, but, to the Boy's surprise, showing no fight.
"She no want you," whispered Muckluck to the Boy. "She like Joe like him best of all." Then, as the Boy gaped incredulously: "She tell me heap long time ago she want Joe." "That's just part of the weddin' festivity," says the Colonel, as renewed shrieks issued from under the snow. "You've been an officious interferer, and I think the sooner I get you out o' Pymeut the healthier it'll be for you."
If it's a question between a man's life and a dog's life, only a sentimental fool would hesitate." "I'm not talking about that; we can get fish now. What I'm pointin' out is that Nig didn't fly at you for nothin'." "He's got a devil of a temper, that dog." "It's just like Nicholas of Pymeut said." The Boy sat up, eager in his advocacy and earnest as a judge.
Nicholas of Pymeut had gone back as pilot of the Weare, but Princess Muckluck was still about, now with Skookum Bill, son of the local chief, now alone, trudging up and down Bonanza like one looking for something lost. The Colonel heard her voice outside the tent and had her in. "You goin' to marry Skookum Bill, as they say?"
"Those your dogs howling?" the visitor asked, thinking that for sheer dismalness Pymeut would be hard to beat. Nicholas stopped suddenly and dropped down; the ground seemed to open and swallow him. The Boy stooped and saw his friend's feet disappearing in a hole. He seized one of them. "Hold on; wait for me!"
"We sleep Pymeut to-night," says Nicholas. "Which way?" The native jerked his head up the river. "Many people there?" He nodded. "White men, too?" He shook his head. "How far to the nearest white men?" Nicholas's mind wandered from the white man's catechism and fixed itself on his race's immemorial problem: how far it was to the nearest thing to eat. "I thought you said he could speak English."
And that same afternoon we had a half-breed trader fella here, with two white men. Since that day we haven't seen a human creature. We bought some furs of the trader. Where'd you get yours?" "Pymeut. Any news about the strike?" "Well, the trader fella was sure it was all gammon, and told us stories of men who'd sacrificed everything and joined a stampede, and got sold sold badly.
As the Story-teller seemed to be about to repeat the enlivening tradition concerning the almost mythical youth of Ol' Chief's father, that subject of the great Katharine's, whose blood was flowing still in Pymeut veins, just then in came Yagorsha's daughter with some message to her father. He grunted acquiescence, and she turned to go. Joe called something after her, and she snapped back.
She shook her head, and showed her beautiful teeth an instant in the faint light. Then, rising, half shy, but very firm, "I no wait till summer." He was so appalled for the moment, at the thought of having her on their hands, all this way from Pymeut, on a snowy night, that words failed him. As she watched him she, too, grew grave. "You say me nice girl." "When did I say that?"
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