Jessie could not understand the fluttering pulse in her throat. She had not doubted that her mother was a Blackfoot. All the romance of her clouded birth centered around the unknown father who had died when she was a baby. Stokimatis had not been very clear about that. She had never met the man, according to the story she had told Sleeping Dawn. Neither she nor those of her tribal group knew anything of him. Was there a mystery about his life? In her childish dreams Jessie had woven one. He was to her everything desirable, for he was the tie that bound her to all the higher standards of life she craved.
"I don't know. Likely it's all a mare's nest. Find Stokimatis,
Lemoine, and bring her back with you. Well see what she can tell us.
And get the locket and the ring, with the story back of them."
Again Lemoine referred to the cost. He would have to take his dog-train to Whoop-Up, and from there out to the creek where Pierre Roubideaux was living. Makoye-kin and his family might be wintering anywhere within a radius of a hundred miles. Was there any use in going out on such a wild-hare chase?
Whaley thought there was and said so with finality. He did not give his real reason, which was that he wanted to pay back to McRae and his daughter the debt he owed. They had undoubtedly saved his life after he had treated her outrageously. There was already one score to his credit, of course. He had saved her from West. But he felt the balance still tipped heavily against him. And he was a man who paid his debts.
It was this factor of his make-up—the obligation of old associations laid upon him—that had taken him out to West with money, supplies, and a dog-train to help his escape.
Jessie went out to find her father. Her eagerness to see him outflew her steps. This was not a subject she could discuss with Matapi-Koma. The Cree woman would not understand what a tremendous difference it made if she could prove her blood was wholly of the superior race. Nor could Jessie with tact raise such a point. It involved not only the standing of Matapi-Koma herself, but also of her sons.
The girl found McRae in the storeroom looking over a bundle of assorted pelts—marten, fox, mink, and beaver. The news tumbled from her lips in excited exclamations.
"Oh, Father, guess! Mr. Lemoine saw a picture—a Blackfoot woman had it—old Makoye-kin's wife—and she sold it. And he says it was like me—exactly. Maybe it was my aunt—or some one. My father's sister! Don't you think?"
"I'll ken what I think better gin ye'll just quiet doon an' tell me a' aboot it, lass."
She told him. The Scotchman took what she had to say with no outward sign of excitement. None the less his blood moved faster. He wanted no change in the relations between them that would interfere with the love she felt for him. To him it did not matter whether she was of the pure blood or of the métis. He had always ignored the Indian in her. She was a precious wildling of beauty and delight. By nature she was of the ruling race. There was in her nothing servile or dependent, none of the inertia that was so marked a mental characteristic of the Blackfoot and the Cree. Her slender body was compact of fire and spirit. She was alive to her finger-tips.