“But Scundoo hath,” La-lah made answer.  “And likewise Klok-No-Ton.  This we know.”

“How dost thou know, son of a fool?” Sime thundered, the choleric blood darkening his thick bull neck.

“By the word of their mouths—­even so.”

Sime snorted.  “A shaman is only a man.  May not his words be crooked, even as thine and mine?  Bah!  Bah!  And once more, bah!  And this for thy shamans and thy shamans’ devils! and this! and this!”

And snapping his fingers to right and left, Sime strode through the on-lookers, who made over-zealous and fearsome way for him.

“A good fisher and strong hunter, but an evil man,” said one.

“Yet does he flourish,” speculated another.

“Wherefore be thou evil and flourish,” Sime retorted over his shoulder.  “And were all evil, there would be no need for shamans.  Bah!  You children-afraid-of-the-dark!”

And when Klok-No-Ton arrived on the afternoon tide, Sime’s defiant laugh was unabated; nor did he forbear to make a joke when the shaman tripped on the sand in the landing.  Klok-No-Ton looked at him sourly, and without greeting stalked straight through their midst to the house of Scundoo.

Of the meeting with Scundoo none of the tribespeople might know, for they clustered reverently in the distance and spoke in whispers while the masters of mystery were together.

“Greeting, O Scundoo!” Klok-No-Ton rumbled, wavering perceptibly from doubt of his reception.

He was a giant in stature, and towered massively above little Scundoo, whose thin voice floated upward like the faint far rasping of a cricket.

“Greeting, Klok-No-Ton,” he returned.  “The day is fair with thy coming.”

“Yet it would seem ...”  Klok-No-Ton hesitated.

“Yea, yea,” the little shaman put in impatiently, “that I have fallen on ill days, else would I not stand in gratitude to you in that you do my work.”

“It grieves me, friend Scundoo ...”

“Nay, I am made glad, Klok-No-Ton.”

“But will I give thee half of that which be given me.”

“Not so, good Klok-No-Ton,” murmured Scundoo, with a deprecatory wave of the hand.  “It is I who am thy slave, and my days shall be filled with desire to befriend thee.”

“As I—­”

“As thou now befriendest me.”

“That being so, it is then a bad business, these blankets of the woman Hooniah?”

The big shaman blundered tentatively in his quest, and Scundoo smiled a wan, gray smile, for he was used to reading men, and all men seemed very small to him.

“Ever hast thou dealt in strong medicine,” he said.  “Doubtless the evil-doer will be briefly known to thee.”

“Ay, briefly known when I set eyes upon him.”  Again Klok-No-Ton hesitated.  “Have there been gossips from other places?” he asked.

Scundoo shook his head.  “Behold!  Is this not a most excellent mucluc?”