with low ceiling and walls of hewn logs chinked and plastered and all
beautifully whitewashed and clean. The tables, chairs and benches were
all home-made. On the floor were magnificent skins of wolf, bear, musk
ox and mountain goat. The walls were decorated with heads and horns of
deer and mountain sheep, eagles' wings and a beautiful breast of a loon,
which Gwen had shot and of which she was very proud. At one end of the
room a huge stone fireplace stood radiant in its summer decorations of
ferns and grasses and wild-flowers. At the other end a door opened
into another room, smaller and richly furnished with relics of former
grandeur.

Everything was clean and well kept. Every nook, shelf and corner was
decked with flowers and ferns from the canyon.

A strange house it was, full of curious contrasts, but it fitted this
quaint child that welcomed me with such gracious courtesy.



CHAPTER X

GWEN'S FIRST PRAYERS


It was with hesitation, almost with fear, that I began with Gwen; but
even had I been able to foresee the endless series of exasperations
through which she was destined to conduct me, still would I have
undertaken my task. For the child, with all her wilfulness, her tempers
and her pride, made me, as she did all others, her willing slave.