Like a shot Jan replied:

"I began in Engleesh, an' Jan Thoreau is French!"

He began playing, but Cummins did not hear much of the music. He went
to the door, and stared in lonely grief at the top of the tall spruce
over the grave. Later he said to Jan:

"It would be bad if that were so. Give her no more sweet stuff when
she says 'Bonbon,' Jan. She must forget!"

The next day Jan tore down the sapling barricade around the woman's
grave, and from noon until almost sunset he skirted the sunny side of
a great ridge to the south. When he came back he brought with him a
basket of the early red snow-flowers, with earth clinging to their
roots. These he planted thickly over the mound under the spruce, and
around its edge he put rows of the young shoots of Labrador tea and
backneesh.

As the weather grew warmer, and spring changed into summer, he took
Melisse upon short excursions with him into the forests, and together
they picked great armfuls of flowers and Arctic ferns. The grave was
never without fresh offerings, and the cabin, with its new addition
complete, was always filled with the beautiful things that spring up
out of the earth.

Jan and Melisse were happy; and in the joys of these two there was
pleasure for the others of the post, as there had been happiness in
the presence of the woman. Only upon Cummins had there settled a deep