She was dressed in semi-white style,
and looked, not on the ground, as does an Indian woman, on seeing
a strange man, but straight at me.
"Bon jour, madame," I said.
"I speak Ingliss," she replied with emphasis.
"Indeed! And what is your name?"
"I am Madame X - - - -."
And now I knew I was in the presence of the stuckup social queen.
After some conversation she said: "I have some things at home you
like to see."
"Where is your lodge?" I asked.
"Lodge," she replied indignantly; "I have no lodge. I know ze Indian
way. I know ze half-breed way. I know ze white man's way. I go ze
white man's way. I live in a house - and my door is painted blue."
I went to her house, a 10 by 12 log cabin; but the door certainly
was painted blue, a gorgeous sky blue, the only touch of paint in
sight. Inside was all one room, with a mud fireplace at one end
and some piles of rags in the corners for beds, a table, a chair,
and some pots. On the walls snow-shoes, fishing-lines, dried fish
in smellable bunches, a portrait of the Okapi from Outing, and a
musical clock that played with painful persistence the first three
bars of "God Save the King." Everywhere else were rags, mud, and
dirt.
