Shocked, Chris rallied all her forces, the black eyes glaring, the pink cheeks scarlet. “Is that so! I’ve got Grampa Thor and Grampa Czar, they’re better than anybody, they’re better than anybody’s mother, and I’ve got Bridie. And Alaska. I’ve got Alaska.”

“Alaska?” Puzzled.

“Grampa Thor says Alaska is better than any place in the world, and I’m Alaska history.”

Stunned, the other regarded a moment the wild-eyed infuriated little figure of her antagonist. Then, “You’re crazy,” she announced, decisively, and ran home.

In her childhood she was a question-asker, as were most children of her age, but in her case the custom burgeoned into a habit that sometimes irritated Bridie and enraged Czar. Thor encouraged it. “When you don’t know a thing—ask. I’ll always answer if I can.”

She had been fascinated by the story of Bridie’s arrival in Baranof so many years ago. At twelve, through a series of questions, Chris dug to the core of this situation.

“That place where you nursed the ladies that were sick with smallpox—why was it called the All Nations?”

“The people who lived there came from different countries, I guess. Or claimed they did.”

“You said they were all ladies living at the All Nations house.”

“Yes. Yes, they were.”

“Why? Was it a boardinghouse just for ladies?”

“Kind of.”

“Were they married and did they have children?”

“Well, no. No, they didn’t. Weren’t.”

“Why not?”

“You ask too many questions for a little girl.”

“That’s what you say when it’s something you don’t want to answer. I’ll ask Grampa Thor.”

“No. No, I wouldn’t do that. He’s busy.”

“He says he’s never too busy to answer my questions.”

“There’s things you’re not old enough to understand.”

“If they weren’t married and didn’t have husbands did they work to earn money?”

“In a way. Now run along and don’t bother me, can’t you see I’m busy! Children your age have lots of time to learn things later.”

“Did they earn money at the All Nations place?”

Instinct taught Bridie certain therapeutic methods that, a quarter of a century later, psychiatrists were to put into general use. “They lived there and kept people company—lonely people—men who hadn’t got their families with them, their wives and children and so on, and were working the creeks for gold, those days.”

“Did they love them?”

“Did who love who?”

“Did the ladies at the All Nations love the men who were lonely?”

Bridie started as though some one had jolted the chair in which she was sitting. After a moment she said, quietly, “In a way.”

“Well, if they loved them why didn’t they marry them?”

“Sometimes they did.”

“If they didn’t marry them did they pay them for loving them? Is that the reason they earned money?”

“Yes. And that’s just about enough from you. Who do you think you are, a schoolteacher or something, questions questions questions. Stop it, I say, unless you want the back of my hand.”

“When I grow up nobody will have to pay me for loving them. I’ll love them for nothing.”