stefansson-wrangel-09-30-003-003

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anything to say about Ada Blackjack. This has become more
necessary since we have recently been able to verify the fact that
a manuscript substantially the same as that sent to Mr. Knight has
actually been submitted by Mr. Noice to certain newspapers for
publication. We have not learned that there has been any pub-
lication, for the material appeared to at least some of the papers
(for instance, the Toronto Star) to be of a nature which they did
not care to print whether it were true or not. We are fearful,
however, that other journals less scrupulous may be found later.

If Mr. Noice in his printed statements and in his manu-
scripts sent to Mr. Knight and to the press based his charge of
the "grim tragedy that could have been averted" solely upon things
which either occurred or were alleged to have occurred shortly
before the death of Lorne Knight, the matter could be dealt with
briefly. shortly He seeks his motive for the alleged crime, however, in
diary entries scattered throughout the two years but especially in
those for October to December, 1921, a year and a half before the
tragedy. He evidently wants his readers to infer that here we have
the causes for a treasured anger which resulted more than a year
later in Ada’s refusing "to aid E. Lorne Knight, actual leader of
the party as he lay dying on the island."

Fortunately Lorne Knight made a special effort to be
explicit in his diary on the subject of Ada Blackjack and we are,
therefore, able to tell the whole story in his own words, except
for a few gaps of a line here and a paragraph there in places
where the diary has been mutilated by Mr. Noice. (We are, of course,
not certain that all the paragraphs which Mr. Noice erased dealt with
Ada Blackjack.)