He called loudly. Two of his canoemen rolled a cask to his feet, and, upending it, broached in the head. Seizing a tin cup, LeFroy plunged it into the cask and drank with a great smacking of lips. Then, refilling the cup, he passed it to Sotenah.
"See!" he cried, "it is a present from the _kloshe kloochman_ to the people of MacNair! The people who are down-trodden and oppressed!" Under the spell of the man's words, all fear of the wrath of MacNair vanished, and Sotenah greedily seized the cup and drank, while about him crowded the others rendering the night hideous with their frenzied cries of exultation.
The cask was quickly emptied, and another broached. Old men, women, and children, all drank--and fighting, and leaping, and dancing, and yelling, returned to drink again. For, never within the memory of the oldest, had any Indian drunk the white man's whiskey for which he had not paid.
Darkness fell. Fires were lighted upon the beach, and the wild orgy continued. Other casks were opened, and the drink-crazed Indians yelled and fought and sang in a perfect frenzy of delirium. Fire-brands were hurled high into the air, to fall whirling among the cabins. And it was these whirling brands that riveted the attention of the occupants of the big canoe that approached swiftly along the shore from the direction of the Yellow Knife. LeFroy had timed his work well. In the bow, Lapierre, with a grim smile upon his thin lips, watched the arcs of the whirling brands, while from their position amidship, Chloe and Big Lena stared fascinated upon the scene.
"What are they doing?" cried the girl in amazement. Lapierre turned and smiled into her eyes.
"We have come," he answered, "at a most opportune time. You are about to see MacNair's Indians at their worst. For they seem to be even more drunk than usual. It is MacNair's way--to make them drunk while he looks on and laughs."
"Do you mean," cried the girl in horror, "that they are drunk?"
Lapierre smiled. "Very drunk," he answered dryly. "It is the only way MacNair can hold them--by allowing them free license at frequent intervals. For well the Indians know that nowhere else in all the North would this thing be permitted. Therefore, they remain with MacNair."
