“Two boxes fire powder,” said Olafaksoah.  Papik refused.  Olafaksoah browbeat him in a high voice.  Finally he kicked him.  “One case needles.”  He called Papik’s mother and chucked her under the chin.  She smiled at him, awed, flattered, half afraid.  Papik parted with his load for a box of ammunition and a few needles.  Meanwhile the bartering went on for the hoarded wealth of the tribe.  Eager to precede one another, the natives rushed to and fro, bringing armfuls of ivories and furs from their tents.  In exchange for stuff of trifling value the white men secured, by their method of threatening bargaining, loads of blue and white fox skins, caribou hides, and walrus and narwhal tusks which the natives had previously preserved.  One man parted with five tusks, worth as many hundred dollars, for two gaudy handkerchiefs for his wife.  Another gave several exquisite fox skins for a plug of tobacco.  When they demanded more biscuits, tobacco or matches than were offered, Olafaksoah bullied them with threats.  Yet they hung about him, eager for the almost worthless barter, for the time being valuing a box of crackers and allotments of tea more than their substantial supply of walrus meat.  Finally the leader paused before Ootah’s loaded sledges.

“What’ll you take—­a gun, fire-powder?”

Ootah shook his head.

Olafaksoah had recourse to his stock-in-trade of oaths, and told his men to bring a gun, two hatchets, ammunition.

Ootah was still obdurate.  The natives’ voices arose murmurously, for they felt it was not well to offend the strangers.  During future seasons they might not come again, as they threatened, with ammunition and guns.  This the natives feared as a calamity.

“Bring some crackers—­tea,” Olafaksoah paused.  Ootah watched Annadoah nestling near the “white trader.”  He had forgotten all about the sledges of meat.  He did not hear Olafaksoah.  He still continued shaking his head.

“I’ll be liberal with you, son,” Olafaksoah indulgently increased his offer.

Six more boxes of ammunition, more tea and crackers were added to the pile.

Ootah again mechanically shook his head.  Amid all of those about him, he saw only the face of Annadoah, golden as sunlight and pink as the lichen blossoms of spring.  Through her open ahttee, or fur garment, he saw her breasts as tender as those of eider-feathered birds.  The sight of her melted his heart, the streams of spring were loosened within him.  Yet, with an agonized pang, he observed her gaze adoringly and eagerly at the tall stranger’s hard face; he saw her quiver at the sound of his harsh, gruff voice.  Olafaksoah’s brutal masculinity for the time dominated the shrinking femininity of the girl.  Ootah saw Annadoah beseechingly, almost fawningly, touch the white chief’s horny hand and nestle it close against her cheek.

Olaf, the trader, was oblivious to this.