The Blue Envelope

e mysterious college boy had pa

she wondered what had happened to the frank-eyed, friendly boy. He had not returned. Had a blizzard caught him and snatched his life away? The rivers were overflowing their banks now, though thick and rotten ice was

t with her deer herd when the first letter had come, but had now been home for a month. The two of them had laughed and wondered about that letter. They had put

n. Little gasoline schooners would go flitting here and there like sea-gulls, and then would come the hoarse voice of the Corwin, mail steamer for Arctic. She woul

hings, she started suddenly. S

xclaimed, t

th his nose. His hair was ragged and matted. His bones protruded at ev

aid; "you're looking

uth, allowing his lon

in luck. The natives caught a hundred or more salmon through

d for joy. He read the sign in her eyes

s gulping down a fat, f

curious questioni

in a team. Too old. Bad feet. No, sir, you can't be any good, or you wouldn't be back here in five days. We gave you to T

s were next to humans. In the North they w

rson who'd feed you and call you friend. Mr. Jack London has written a book about a white man's dog that turned wild and joined a wolf-pack. It's a wonderful book, but I don't believe it. A white man's dog wants a w

rth, or the walrus come barking in from Bering Sea, then you can stay with us and get sleek and fat. You can sleep by

owled his

their cabin as his home. When food had become scarce, they had been forced to give him to an Eskimo traveling up the coast. Now, in five days he was back again.

an she heard a growl from the dog,

shouted, as she s

as badly dressed and unshaven.

He kicked at the dog

flashed, but s

ffice?" The man

s,

a letter h

she smiled. "Won

n came

, "I'll see. Wh

n't matter. Won't be addressed t

et a closely-folded,

yes, the very shade of blue of that other in the pigeo

at?" the man demanded, squintin

red him, as well. Yet he had asked for the letter and had offered be

His searching eyes were upon her. "Yes, there was one. It cam

gave it

as if to strike Mari

king quickly, Marian caught the quest

n's ar

Why should I not? He offered no real proof

en

ght have picked that envelope up in the street, or

boy was it?" the ma

g young fellow, with blue

ved. "Honest-lookin', yes, honest-lookin'.

the growl f

re the latest blue envelope rested. She caught an easy br

r it's mine! Mine!" growled the man,

between her hands. "I'm glad you're here. When

belied his nature? What if he were honest? And what if her good-looking college b

damp air of Arctic twilight by the sea was balm to her troubled brain. Sh

south sent the ice-floes rushing through the Straits. They hastened away to seas unknown, not to return for months.

ciety. They now wrote to her, asking that she spend a summer on the Arctic coast of Siberia, making sketches of these natives, who so like the Eskimos are yet so unlike them in many ways. The pay, they assured her, would be ample; in fact, the figures fairly staggere

r through, she went for a f

she burst in on

d, "how would you like

eri

. "But I thought all political prisoners had

oking," sa

ain t

two weeks her school work would be finished. It would be a strange, a delightful summer. Their enthusiasm grew as they tal

over?" exclaimed

schooner,

I know who run those crafts

nsidered

skin-boa

ng-to cross from the new worl

rian. "Did you ever hear of a

at King's Island, a hundred a

we could

ght, le

uch, and fifteen minutes later was dreaming of a tossing ski

iled and paddled over a sea as placid as a mill-pond. Here a brown seal bobbed his head out of the water; here a spectacled eiderduck rode up and

ad settled down over the sea. They were drifting and paddling slowly forward,

schooner,"

houting to avert a

og. It took shape. Men were seen on the deck. It came

en riding in the bow standing well forward, as if taking the place of a painted figurehead, suddenly

. The next instant the schooner had faded

?" asked Luc

y a

ho

e blue envelope; Rover

ose he knew, an

ould h

he going to

y do that a great deal

n shi

g out over the sea, singing their merry song as if to greet them. They would soon be living in a tent in the midst of a city of tents. They w

things Marian's cheeks

ll come to us here?