Page:McLoughlin and Old Oregon.djvu/78



"What, you a friend of the whites and say not a word in their behalf at such a time as this? Speak! You know the murderer deserved to die. According to your own laws the deed was just! It is blood for blood. The white men are not dogs. They love their kindred as well as you! Why should they not avenge their murder?" Awed by the skookum turn-turn (strong heart) of the trader's daughter the Indians fled from the room. As the last blanket flopped through the gate the old chief standing in the door called after them in derisive tone: "You braves! Woman make you run! Go home. Hide in leedle holes! "

Young Douglas married the girl. Chief Factor Connolly read the ritual and gave away the bride. Then over the mountains Connolly went to Canada, where shortly he became the Mayor of Montreal.

As for Douglas, he took his wife down the Columbia, where in the then new Fort Vancouver they took up the quarters they had occupied ever since. The gentle Nelia had grown and ripened with the years, until the comely young matron was only a degree less attractive than Eloise herself. At the west end of that same porch was the door to their sitting-room, where on any Sabbath evening you might find Douglas with the Bible on his knee reading to his wife and little ones. It was a sweet home picture; one of the few, very few, to be found the entire length of McLoughlin's kingdom.

Summer mornings found Nelia the third in that group upon the porch, while her little daughter Cecelia in a pink sun-bonnet played among the flower-beds at the foot of the steps. There Douglas had scattered fine seed, and in floral letters had sprung his little daughter's name "Cecelia."

There were other things besides flowers at the foot