Part 23 (1/2)
”Oh, no, nothing like that,” smiled Marian.
”Anyway you'll help me with my book, won't you? I have it only a third finished. After dinner I'll read that to you and you may tell me frankly whether it's any good or not.”
”I tried a story once myself,” said Lucile with a laugh.
”How did you come out with it?”
”Haven't come out yet, but I'm really crazy to get back to the city and find out about it. I mailed it to the editor of 'Seaside Tales'.”
The igloo was heated by genuine seal-oil lamps and over these Marie cooked her food. The pots and kettles were of the antique copper type traded to Eskimos by Russians long before the white man reached the Arctic sh.o.r.e of Alaska. The food cooked in this manner over a slow fire was declared to be delicious.
”And now,” said their hostess, when the dishes had been washed and put away, ”I'll introduce you to my alcove bedroom.”
Drawing aside a pair of heavy deerskin curtains she revealed a platform some six by eight feet. This was piled high with skin rugs of all descriptions. White bearskin, Russian squirrel, red fox and beaver rivaled one another in softness and richness of coloring.
”You see,” she explained, ”it's sort of a compromise between the narrow shelf of the Eskimo igloo and the broader sleeping room of the Chukches of Siberia.”
Lucile and Marian were fascinated. It took them back to the old days of Cape Prince of Wales, of East Cape and Siberia.
”Tell you what,” exclaimed Lucile. ”We'll all get fixed nice and comfy for going to sleep, then we'll spread ourselves out in the midst of all those wonderful rugs and you may read your book to us.”
”Yes, and you'll be asleep in ten minutes,” laughed Marie.
”No, no! No we won't,” they all exclaimed.
”Then it's a bargain.”
A few moments later filmy pink and white garments vied in color and softness with the rugs of Arctic furs while Marie in a well modulated tone read the beginning of the story of Nowadluk, the belle of Alaska.
The three companions were quite content to listen. The ways of life seemed once more very good to them. Their friends had been notified by radiophone of their safety. They were to return to-morrow or the day after. The wind had changed. The ice was already beginning to scatter.
Now and then Lucile or Marian would interrupt the reader to make a suggestion. When the end had been reached they were unanimous in their a.s.surance that it promised to be a wonderful story. Their only regrets were that more of it was not completed.
A half hour later Lucile and Marian were asleep. Florence and Marie were talking in whispers. Florence had been relating their strange and weird experiences while living aboard the O Moo.
”So that's why you thought I was held captive by the Negontisks?” Marie chuckled.
”But really,” she said presently, ”there _were_ some of those people in Chicago. May be yet, but no one knows.”
”Tell me about it,” Florence breathed excitedly.
”I don't know a great deal about it, only they were brought over from Siberia for exhibition purposes during a fair in Seattle. From there they were brought to Chicago by a show company. The company ran out of money and disbanded. The Negontisks were thrown upon their own resources.
”They were getting along one way or another when it was discovered that they were wors.h.i.+pping some kind of idol.”
”A blue face,” whispered Florence breathlessly.
”Something like that. It was believed that in their religious rites they resorted to inhuman practices. The government looked into the matter and decided to deport them. But just when the officials were preparing to round them up, they found that the last one of them had vanished--vanished as completely as they might had the earth opened up and swallowed them.
”That was two or three years ago. The papers were full of it. I think there was a reward offered for their capture. But I believe they never found a trace of them or their blue G.o.d.”