'Here's a pretty kettle of fish!' said Tegumai. 'It will take me
half the day to mend this.'

'There's your big black spear at home,' said Taffy. 'Let me run
back to the Cave and ask Mummy to give it me.'

'It's too far for your little fat legs,' said Tegumai. 'Besides,
you might fall into the beaver-swamp and be drowned. We must make
the best of a bad job.' He sat down and took out a little leather
mendy-bag, full of reindeer-sinews and strips of leather, and
lumps of bee's-wax and resin, and began to mend the spear.

Taffy sat down too, with her toes in the water and her chin in
her hand, and thought very hard. Then she said--'I say, Daddy,
it's an awful nuisance that you and I don't know how to write,
isn't it? If we did we could send a message for the new spear.'

'Taffy,' said Tegumai, 'how often have I told you not to use
slang? "Awful" isn't a pretty word, but it could be a
convenience, now you mention it, if we could write home.'

Just then a Stranger-man came along the river, but he belonged to
a far tribe, the Tewaras, and he did not understand one word of
Tegumai's language. He stood on the bank and smiled at Taffy,
because he had a little girl-daughter Of his own at home. Tegumai
drew a hank of deer-sinews from his mendy-bag and began to mend
his spear.

'Come here, said Taffy. 'Do you know where my Mummy lives?' And
the Stranger-man said 'Um!' being, as you know, a Tewara.