The woman did not speak.
She held up her child for each man to kiss, and the baby babbled
meaningless things into the bearded faces that it had come to know and
love, and when it came to Williams' turn he whispered, "Be a good baby,
be a good baby." And when it was all over the woman crushed the child to
her breast and dropped sobbing upon the sledge, and Jan cracked his whip
and shouted hoarsely to the dogs, for it was Jan who was to drive her to
civilization. Long after they had disappeared beyond the clearing those
who remained stood looking at the cabin; and then, with a dry, strange
sob in his throat, Williams led the way inside. When they came out
Williams brought a hammer with him, and nailed the door tight.
"Mebby she'll come back some day," he said.
That was all, but the others understood.
For nine days Jan raced his dogs into the South. On the tenth they came
to Le Pas. It was night when they stopped before the little log hotel,
and the gloom hid the twitching in Jan's face.
"You will stay here--to-night?" asked the woman.
"Me go back--now," said Jan.
Cummins' wife came very close to him. She did not urge, for she, too, was
suffering the torture of this last parting with the "honor of the Beeg
Snows." It was not the baby's face that came to Jan's now, but the
woman's. He felt the soft touch of her lips, and his soul burst forth in
a low, agonized cry.
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