He held up the foot-covering of sealskin and walrus hide, and his visitor examined it with secret interest.

“It did come to me by a close-driven bargain.”

Klok-No-Ton nodded attentively.

“I got it from the man La-lah.  He is a remarkable man, and often have I thought ...”

“So?” Klok-No-Ton ventured impatiently.

“Often have I thought,” Scundoo concluded, his voice falling as he came to a full pause.  “It is a fair day, and thy medicine be strong, Klok-No-Ton.”

Klok-No-Ton’s face brightened.  “Thou art a great man, Scundoo, a shaman of shamans.  I go now.  I shall remember thee always.  And the man La-lah, as you say, is a remarkable man.”

Scundoo smiled yet more wan and gray, closed the door on the heels of his departing visitor, and barred and double-barred it.

Sime was mending his canoe when Klok-No-Ton came down the beach, and he broke off from his work only long enough to ostentatiously load his rifle and place it near him.

The shaman noted the action and called out:  “Let all the people come together on this spot!  It is the word of Klok-No-Ton, devil-seeker and driver of devils!”

He had been minded to assemble them at Hooniah’s house, but it was necessary that all should be present, and he was doubtful of Sime’s obedience and did not wish trouble.  Sime was a good man to let alone, his judgment ran, and withal, a bad one for the health of any shaman.

“Let the woman Hooniah be brought,” Klok-No-Ton commanded, glaring ferociously about the circle and sending chills up and down the spines of those he looked upon.

Hooniah waddled forward, head bent and gaze averted.

“Where be thy blankets?”

“I but stretched them up in the sun, and behold, they were not!” she whined.

“So?”

“It was because of Di Ya.”

“So?”

“Him have I beaten sore, and he shall yet be beaten, for that he brought trouble upon us who be poor people.”

“The blankets!” Klok-No-Ton bellowed hoarsely, foreseeing her desire to lower the price to be paid.  “The blankets, woman!  Thy wealth is known.”

“I but stretched them up in the sun,” she sniffled, “and we be poor people and have nothing.”

He stiffened suddenly, with a hideous distortion of the face, and Hooniah shrank back.  But so swiftly did he spring forward, with in-turned eyeballs and loosened jaw, that she stumbled and fell down grovelling at his feet.  He waved his arms about, wildly flagellating the air, his body writhing and twisting in torment.  An epilepsy seemed to come upon him.  A white froth flecked his lips, and his body was convulsed with shiverings and tremblings.