Eskimo that lives in a hole in the ground. That’s what he is to me. But to you he’s Mister Il-ay-ok. Bah!” The man turned and walked away.

For a full moment nothing further was said. At last, in a steady, school-book voice the little man in black said, “Do you know what my people did to the first white man who visit our village?”

“No. What?” Mary stared.

“Shot him,” the little man’s voice dropped. “Shot him with a whale gun. Very big gun. Shoot big shell. Like this!” He held up a clenched fist. “Very bad man like this one. He talked too big,” the little man scowled.

“And would you like to shoot that one?” Mary asked, nodding toward the retreating figure.

“Not now. Mebby byum bye. You see,” the little man smiled, “I go to visit your country. I am—”

At that moment Florence Huyler, Mary’s big cousin came booming along from behind the pile of goods, to cry: “Ah! There you are! I’ve been looking everywhere for you.”

“Florence,” Mary stopped her, “this is Mr. Il-ay-ok. He’s from Alaska, and he wants to kill a white man, but not just now.” She laughed in spite of herself.

“But this is Alaska.” Florence, who was big and strong as a man, looked at the little man and smiled as she asked, “Is this your home?”

“No—no,” the little man bowed. “Much more north my home. Cape Nome sometimes and sometimes Cape Prince Wales.”

“Oh you’ve been in Nome?” Florence’s eyes shone. “My grandfather went there years and years ago. He never came back.”

“Name please?” the little man asked.

“Tom Kennedy.”

“Ah yes,” the little man beamed. “I know him. Big man. Very good man.”

“What?” the big girl’s eyes fairly bulged. “You, you know my grandfather? No! No! He is dead. He must have died years ago.”

“Not dead please. Tom Kennedy not dead,” the little man appeared puzzled. “No not dead. Let me tell you.” He took a step toward them. “Very big man. Very straight. Always smile. Let me show you.” To their vast surprise the girls saw the little man produce from an inside pocket a small, ivory paper knife. On its blade had been carved the likeness of a man’s face. It may not have been a very accurate picture, there was, however, one touch that could not be wrong, a scar above the left eye. “Tom Kennedy my friend,” the native said simply.

“Tom Kennedy, my long-lost grandfather!” Florence stared in unbelief. “He is dead. And yet, he—he must be alive!” She closed her eyes as she tried to think clearly. Often and often as a small child she had heard her mother describe this man, her grandfather. Often too she had seen his picture. Always there had been that scar over the left eye.

“Mary!” she exclaimed, her voice rising high. “My grandfather is alive, somewhere away up there!” she faced north. “I’m going.”

“Oh, but you couldn’t leave us!” Mary’s tone vibrated with consternation. “You couldn’t leave us, not just now!”

“That—that’s right. I couldn’t—not just now.” The big girl’s hands dropped limply to her side.

From the distance came the long drawn hoarse hoot of a steamboat whistle.

“Excuse please,” the little man who called himself Mr. Il-ay-ok bowed low. “My boat please. I go to visit America. Perhaps please, we meet again.”

With the swift, sure movement of one who has followed a dog team over long, long miles or has hunted on the treacherous ice-floes, he was gone.

“No,” Florence repeated slowly as if to herself, “I can’t leave you now.”

For one full moment she stood staring at the spot from which the little man had vanished. Here indeed was a strange situation. All her life she had believed her grandfather dead. From her mother’s lips she had heard vague stories of how he had gone into the north and never returned. Now here was a little Eskimo saying, “Tom Kennedy my friend. Yes, I know him. He is alive.”

“And he proved it too,” the girl whispered to herself.

Then, of a sudden, her thoughts came back to the present and to her immediate surroundings.

“What a jumble!” she said, looking at the heap of goods that, as moments passed, grew higher and higher. “How will they ever get them sorted out?”

Turning to her cousin, bright-eyed, eager Mary, she said: “‘A ticket to adventure,’ that’s what the man back there in San Francisco called it, ‘a ticket to adventure.’ Will it truly be an adventure? I wonder.”

“I hope so!” Mary’s eyes shone.

Turning, the two girls walked away toward a distant spot on the long dock where a boy, who had barely grown into a young man, was struggling at the task of setting up a small umbrella tent.

“See!” the big girl cried, “there’s Mark. He’s setting up our first home in a wilderness.”

CHAPTER II
THE INDIAN GIRL’S WARNING

Hours later Florence stirred uneasily in her sleep, then half-awake murmured dreamily: “A ticket to adventure. That’s what he said, a ticket—”

Conscious now that some disturbing sound had come to her in her sleep, she shook herself into further wakefulness.

“Strange,” she murmured. “Everything is so strange.”

Indeed it was. The bed on which she and Mary slept was hard, a mattress on the dock. About her, shielding her from the Arctic wind was a tent.

“Tomorrow,” she thought, “we start to the Promised Land.” This land was the Matamuska Valley in Alaska. “Not far now, only a short way by rail. And then—” A thrill ran through her being. They were to be pioneers, modern pioneers, she and Mary, Mark and her aunt. What would life in this new land be?

She had seen much of life, had Florence, city life, country life, the wild beauty of Isle Royale in Lake Superior, and the finished beauty of France were not new to her. But Alaska! How she had thrilled at thought of it! She was thinking of all this when, of a sudden, she raised herself on one elbow to listen. “What was that sound?” she whispered. It was faint, indistinct, disturbing.

Then Mary sleeping at her side, did a strange thing. Sitting bolt upright she said: “Don’t you want to kill him?”

For a space of seconds she appeared to listen for an answer. Then, with a sigh, she murmured, “Oh! All right. Some other time.” At that, she sank back in her place to draw the covers closely about her.

“Talking in her sleep,” the big girl thought. “Dreaming of the little man in black. She—”

There was that sound again, more distinct now. “A child crying in the night.” Florence listened intently.

“It’s such a low cry,” she thought wearily, creeping back among the blankets. “It can’t be anything very much. There has been so much crying.”

Ah yes, there had been children’s cries that day; rough, unkind words had been said at times to the children. Little wonder, for they had that day—hundreds of men, women and children—disembarked from a ship that carried them far toward their promised land, the Matamuska Valley in Alaska.

They had been dumped quite unceremoniously, a whole shipload of people with cows, horses, dogs, cats, canaries, trucks, tractors, tents, lumber, hardware, groceries, shoes, hammers, saws, and clothespins on the dock at Anchorage. Men dashed about searching for tents and baggage. Women sought out lost or strayed pets. Children had cried and above it all had come the hoarse shout of some enthusiast: “On! On! to