Lady Silence had watched while he packed away the old napkin and his mother’s crock—items that he realized much later she might very much have wanted—but now she touched her cheek with the silk handkerchief a final time and tried to hand that back to him. “No,” said Irving, “that is a gift from me. A token of my friendship and deep esteem. You must keep it. I would be offended if you do not.” Then he tried to sign and act out what he had just said. The muscles along either side of the young Esquimaux woman’s mouth almost twitched as she watched him. He pushed her hand holding the handkerchief
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