CHAPTER XX
COMPLICATIONS
Devinne’s trading-post was not the sort of place one expected to find in Alaska. Devinne himself was a queer customer, a man of good education and birth. That he chose to establish a trading-post on the upper reaches of the Yukon was a mystery to all who knew him. The real reason was a secret in the heart of Devinne, and had reference to a quarrel in a Parisian club in which a blow had been struck in a moment of pardonable fury, resulting in the death of a revered citizen of Paris.
Devinne found the Yukon district a comparatively “healthy” spot. He had started the trading-post four years back, and had prospered very considerably. He had started in a small way, taking trips into Indian villages and bargaining for furs. A man of quick intelligence, he soon acquired a substantial knowledge of most of the 269 queer Indian dialects, which proved a tremendous asset from a business point of view.
After one year’s profitable trading he had built the “post.” It was a fairly commodious affair, boasting three rooms upstairs and three below, plus a long shed attached to the rear of the main building where he carried on his business, with two half-breed assistants, who slept in the shed itself.
A year after the post was completed Natalie, Devinne’s only daughter, a woman of uncertain age, came out to keep house for him. Natalie had all the quick passions of her Southern mother, which doubtlessly accounted for the sudden rupture between herself and her husband after but a brief span of married life.
Two years in Alaska had not changed her nature. Unlike Devinne, she was quick to anger. She ruled her father as completely as she had ruled her husband, until that worthy sought refuge under the wing of another, less tyrannous, woman.
On this night, in late May, Natalie and her father sat in the big front room which afforded them an uninterrupted view of the river. Natalie 270 was busy at crochet-work, and Devinne was going over some accounts with a view to finding what profit the year had yielded. Judging by his frequent purrs and sighs, the result was not displeasing. Natalie looked up.