Then she recognised the claim of race, and
came to their doors with pity and soft impulses to help them. French and
Scotch and English half-breeds, as they were, they understood how she was
making a fight for all who were half-Indian, half-white, and watched her
with a furtive devotion, acknowledging her superior place, and proud of
it.
"I will not stay here," said the Indian mother with sullen stubbornness.
"I will go back beyond the Warais. My life is my own life, and I will do
what I like with it."
The girl started, but became composed again on the instant. "Is your life
all your own, mother?" she asked. "I did not come into the world of my
own will. If I had I would have come all white or all Indian. I am your
daughter, and I am here, good or bad--is your life all your own?"
"You can marry and stay here, when I go. You are twenty. I had my man,
your father, when I was seventeen. You can marry. There are men. You have
money. They will marry you--and forget the rest."
With a cry of rage and misery the girl sprang to her feet and started
forwards, but stopped suddenly at sound of a hasty knocking and a voice
asking admittance. An instant later, a huge, bearded, broad-shouldered
man stepped inside, shaking himself free of the snow, laughing
half-sheepishly as he did so, and laying his fur-cap and gloves with
exaggerated care on the wide window-sill.
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