"Colina Gaviller, the trader's daughter," said Poly.

"Is she real white?" asked Peter cautiously.

"White as raspberry flowers!" asseverated Poly with extravagant
gestures; "white as clouds in the summer! white as sugar! Her hair is
lak golden-rod; her eyes blue lak the lake when the wind blows over it
in the morning!"

Peter glanced again at his partner, but Ambrose was farthest from the
window, and there was nothing to be read in his face.

"Sure," said Peter; "but was her mother a white woman ?"

"They say so," said Poly. "Her long tam dead."

"When did the girl come?" asked Peter.

"Las' fall before the freeze-up," said Poly. "She come down the Spirit
River from the Crossing on a raf'. Michel Trudeau and his wife, they
bring her. Her fat'er he not know she comin'. Her fat'er want her
live outside and be a lady. She say 'no!' She say ladies mak' her
sick.' Michel tell me she say that.

"She want always to ride and paddle a canoe and hunt. Michel say she
is more brave as a man! John Gaviller say she got go out again this
summer. She say 'no!' She is not afraid of him. Me, I t'ink she lak
to be the only white girl in the country, lak a queen."