During those months the post was silent. It lived and breathed, but
that was all. Its life, for Williams and the few people whom the
company kept with him, was a life of waiting. Now the change was at
hand. It was like the breath of spring to the awakening wilderness.
The forest people were moving. Trap-lines were being broken, shacks
abandoned, sledge-dogs put to harness. On the day that Jean de Gravois
left for Hudson's Bay, the company's supplies came in from Fort
Churchill--seven toboggans drawn by Eskimo dogs, laden with flour and
cloth; fifty pounds of beads, ammunition, and a hundred other things
to be exchanged for the furs that would soon be in London and Paris.

Fearfully Jan Thoreau ran out to meet the sledges. There were seven
Indians and one white man. Jan thrust himself close to look at the
white man. He wore two revolver-holsters and carried an automatic.
Unquestionably he was not a missionary, but an agent of the company
well prepared to care for the company's treasure.

Jan hurried back to the cabin, his heart bubbling with a strange joy.

"There ees no missioner, Melisse!" he cried triumphantly, dropping
beside her, his face glowing with the gladness of his tidings. "You
shall be good and beautiful, lak HER, but you shall not be baptize by
missioner! He has not come!"

A few minutes later Cummins came in. One of his hands was torn and
bleeding.

"Those Eskimo dogs are demons!" he growled. "If they knew how to stand
on their legs, they'd eat our huskies alive! Will you help me with