By the middle of May the snow had nearly disappeared, and the first of June saw the rivers running free of ice. It was then that Wentworth "borrowed" Sven Larson from the factor and dropped down Gods River in a canoe to its confluence with the Shamattawa. Camp was made at the head of the rapids. Thereafter for five days Hedin worked under Wentworth's direction, while the engineer ran his levels and established his contour. In the evenings as they sat by the campfire smoking, Hedin preserved the same stolid silence that he had studiously observed since the coming of Wentworth. "Murchison says you know all about fur," Wentworth suggested one evening. "And the finished fur? Do you know that, too--about, well, for instance kolinsky, and nutria, and Russian sable?" "Kolinsky and nutria are no good. We do not have them here. Russian sable, and sea otter, and black fox, they are the best furs in the world. We do not have them here, either, except once in a while a black, or a silver fox." "A coat of Russian sable would be very valuable?" "Yes. Real Russian sable, dark, and well silvered, would be very valuable." "How much would one be worth?" "Nobody can tell unless they can see it. It is all in the matching." For a full minute Wentworth studied the face across the little fire, the face with the unkempt beard, and the far-off, pondering eyes. "I have a Russian sable coat," ventured Wentworth. The factor's clerk gazed at him with unwinking blue eyes, and the head wagged slowly. "No. Russian sable is woman's fur. They do not make men's coats of Russian sable." "But this is a woman's coat," explained Wentworth. "I got it in Russia when I was in the Army. She was a Russian princess and I helped her escape from the country at great risk to myself. It was in the winter, in the dead of night, and a terrible blizzard was raging. When she safely crossed the border she thanked me with tears in her eyes and begged me to take her coat in payment, as she had no money. I refused, but she tossed it into my arms, and disappeared into the night." "Maybe she died in the storm without her coat." "Why, no--you see, she had--that is, I had arranged for a car--a sleigh, I mean, to meet her there with plenty of robes. But what I want to get at, is this. If I show you this coat will you promise not to say a word to Murchison about it? I do not want him to know I have it. He would want to buy it, and he is my friend and I do not want to refuse him. But I do not want to sell the coat, because sometime I am going to return it to its original owner. But first I should like you to tell me what it is worth. Can you tell me that? And can you remember never to tell Murchison that I have the coat?"