"Well," smiled Brent, "Perhaps not so awfully glad—right at first. But Wananebish and I are good friends, now."
"I am glad. I love Wananebish. She is good to me. She has deprived herself of many things—sometimes I think, even of food, that I might stay in school at the mission. And now it is too late to hunt today, and I am hungry. Let us go in the cabin and eat."
"Fine!" cried Brent, "Hey, Joe Pete, cut some caribou steaks, and I'll build up the fire!" He turned again to the girl, "Come on," he laughed, "I could eat a raw dog!"
"But, there is plenty of meat!" cried the girl, "And you'll need the dogs! Only when men are starving will they eat their dogs—and not raw!"
Brent laughed heartily into the dismayed face: "You need not be afraid, we will save the dogs till we need them. That was only a figure of speech. I meant that I am very hungry, and that, if I could find nothing else to eat I should relish even raw dog meat."
Snowdrift was laughing, now: "I see!" she cried, "In books are many such sayings. It is a metaphor—no, not a metaphor—a—oh, I don't remember, but anyway I am glad you said that because I thought such things were used only in the language of books—and maybe I can say one like that myself, someday."
At the door of the cabin they removed their snowshoes, and a few moments later a wood fire was roaring in the little stove. Joe Pete came in with the frozen steaks, set them down upon the table, and moved toward the door, but Brent called him back. "You're in on this feed! Get busy and fry up those steaks while I set the table."
The Indian hesitated, glanced shrewdly at Brent as if to ascertain the sincerity of the invitation, and throwing off his parka, busied himself at the stove, while Brent and Snowdrift, laughing and chattering like children, placed the porcelain lined plates and cups and the steel knives and forks upon the uneven pole table.
The early darkness was gathering when they again left the cabin. Snowdrift paused to watch Joe Pete throw wood into the flames that leaped
from the mouth of the shallow shaft: "Why do you have the fire in the hole?" she asked of Brent, who stood at her side.