“Now, just a minute, young man. What do you mean—rises in the north, sets in the north! Are we on another planet or something!”

“No, sir. Same planet. It’s latitude or longitude, or some say it’s attitude—that’s our little joke—but what I’ve told you is a scientific fact.”

“Don’t you get mixed up, directions and so forth, driving or if you should be lost somewhere in these mountains? Gosh!”

“Nope. We like it this way.”

“Certainly interesting. For a minute there I thought you were joking.”

Chris Storm turned to look straight at Distelhorst. “Another interesting thing about Alaska is the people.”

“People?”

“I think,” Chris persisted, “you’ll find the Alaska people interesting, too.”

“Fine! Fine! Glad to hear it and delighted to meet them. Wonderful country and wonderful people and wonderful scenery. Scenery! Why, say, coming up here on the plane—of course I’ve been in Colorado and California and after the War I made a tour for the Government with a committee of Congressmen and Senators to look over the European situation—we flew over the Alps and a lot of others, but I want to tell you they’re all just ice-cream sodas compared to these you’ve got here. Scare you.”

“The people,” Chris said again, “are even more astonishing than the mountains.”

“I’m here to learn. Here to learn about this great empire of the North, its resources, its economy, its people.” He now leaned forward and with one gloved forefinger prodded Ross Guildenstern in the back. “Now you, young man, in the pilot’s uniform. What nationality are you—if you don’t mind my asking? I’ve got a pretty good guess, but you tell me.”

As Guildenstern turned his head Dina Drake thought, He’s absolutely thrilling when he smiles. Photogenic. Pictures. “I don’t mind,” Ross said. “I’m an American. North American.”

Distelhorst shook his head a little, but tolerantly. “Well, now, you might say the North American Indian is an American, but at the same time, why—–”

“You sure might,” Ott Decker agreed, forgetting for an instant his Chamber of Commerce secretarial role. A ripple of laughter—a giggle, in fact—escaped Chris.

Ross explained, pleasantly. “My mother was part Eskimo. My father was Danish. That explains the name. Guildenstern.”

“You don’t say! Say, that’s interesting.” Distelhorst took out a notebook and, somewhat handicapped by his fur-lined gloves, scribbled industriously for a moment. “Well, now, how long you been here?”

“I’ve been here all my life. Except during the War, of course.”

“No, no. You Eskimos, I mean. How long you been here in Alaska? Way before the Russians, that’s for sure. I’ve been reading up on Alaska, the Russian occupation and so forth, I did quite a little reading on the plane. When we bought it off of Russia people called it Seward’s Folly. A smart forward-looking guy if there ever was one. We’d be in a fine fix today if Alaska was Russian. We bought the whole darned shebang,” he announced, as though triumphantly producing a fascinating fact hitherto unknown, “the whole darn shebang—gold, furs, fish, timber, copper, millions of acres, twice the size of Texas, mind you, for seven million dollars. Seven million bucks, can you imagine! That was back in—let’s see now—–”