He felt a considerable sense of importance,
too, at the confidence Mr. MacPherson reposed in him in suggesting
that he might place him in charge of an important mail. And what a
tale he would have to tell! Bessie would think him quite a hero. After
all it had turned out well. He had caught a silver fox and all the
other fur--quite enough, he was sure, to send Emily to the hospital.
God had been very good to him and he cast his eyes to heaven and
breathed a little prayer of thanksgiving.
Sishetakushin and Mookoomahn had been quite forgotten by Bob in the
excitement of the arrival at the Fort. Now he saw them and the two
other Indians coming over from the cabin to which they had gone when
he left them to meet Mr. MacPherson, and he hurried down to meet them
and tell them that he had found a way to reach home. It was plain that
they did not approve of the turn matters had taken, for they only
grunted and said nothing.
They turned to a building where the door stood open and Bob
accompanied them and entered with them. This was the Post shop, and a
young man, whom Bob had not seen before, presumably "Lord Salisbury,"
the chief clerk of whom the talkative "Secretary Bayard" had spoken,
was behind the counter attending to the wants of an Eskimo and his
wife, the latter with a black-eyed, round-faced baby which sat
contentedly in her hood sucking a stick of black tobacco.
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