splash into the water. The Indian scrambled clumsily ashore, and the
piece was rescued, but not before a perfect torrent of
French-English-Indian profanity had poured from the lips of the
ever-versatile Vermilion. Harriet Penny shrank against the younger
woman and shuddered.

"Oh!" she gasped, "he's swearing!"

"No!" exclaimed Chloe, in feigned surprise. "Why, I believe he is!"

Miss Penny flushed. "But, it is terrible! Just listen!"

"For Heaven's sake, Hat! If you don't like it, why do you listen?"

"But he ought to be stopped. I am sure the poor Indian did not _try_
to fall in the river."

Chloe made a gesture of impatience. "Very well, Hat; just look up the
ordinance against swearing on Slave River, and report him to Ottawa."

"But I'm afraid! He--the Hudson Bay Company's man--told us not to
come."

Chloe straightened up with a jerk. "See here, Hat Penny! Stop your
snivelling! What do you expect from rivermen? Haven't the seven
hundred miles of water trail taught you _anything_? And, as for being
afraid--I don't care _who_ told us not to come! I'm an Elliston, and
I'll go whereever I want to go! This isn't a pleasure trip. I came up
here for a purpose. Do you think I'm going to be scared out by the
first old man that wags his head and shrugs his shoulders? Or by any