'Never mind,
Tommy,' she'd say, day after day, that weak she could bare lift a snow-
shoe and her feet raw with the work. 'Never mind. I'd sooner be flat-
bellied of hunger and be your woman, Tommy, than have a _potlach_ every
day and be Chief George's _klooch_.' George was chief of the Chilcoots,
you know, and wanted her bad.
"Great days, those. Was a likely chap myself when I struck the coast.
Jumped a whaler, the _Pole Star_, at Unalaska, and worked my way down to
Sitka on an otter hunter. Picked up with Happy Jack there--know him?"
"Had charge of my traps for me," Dick answered, "down on the Columbia.
Pretty wild, wasn't he, with a warm place in his heart for whiskey and
women?"
"The very chap. Went trading with him for a couple of seasons--_hooch_,
and blankets, and such stuff. Then got a sloop of my own, and not to cut
him out, came down Juneau way. That's where I met Killisnoo; I called
her Tilly for short. Met her at a squaw dance down on the beach. Chief
George had finished the year's trade with the Sticks over the Passes, and
was down from Dyea with half his tribe. No end of Siwashes at the dance,
and I the only white.
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