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Updated: June 26, 2025
A Cree trapper had found Jan's violin in the snow, and had brought it to Maballa. Before Cummins finished his supper, the boy began to play, and he continued to play until the lights at the post went out and both the man and the child were deep in sleep. Then Jan stopped.
"Do you know," she said, "that Maballa thinks Mukoki is just about the nicest Indian that ever lived? Oh, I'd be so glad if if " She puckered her mouth into a round, red O, and left Rod to guess the rest. It was not difficult for him to understand. "So would I," he cried. Then he added, "Muky is the best fellow on earth." "And Maballa is just as good," said the girl loyally.
He dreamed in it, and it was then that his fingers discovered new things in his violin. He often sent Maballa, the Indian woman who cared for Melisse, to gossip with Williams' wife, so that he was alone a great deal with the baby. At these times, when the door was safely barred against the outside world, it was a different Jan Thoreau who crouched upon his knees beside the cot.
He thrust his knife into its sheath and ran ran swiftly through the packs of dogs fighting and snarling over the scraps that had beep thrown to them; past Maballa who was watching the savage banquet around the big fire, and into the little cabin, to Melisse.
Once, when Melisse straightened herself for an instant, and half reached up her tiny arms to him, laughing and cooing into his face, he gave a glad cry, crushed his face down to hers, and did what he had not dared to do before kissed her. There was something about it that frightened the little Melisse, and she set up a wailing that sent Jan, in a panic of dismay, for Maballa.
Cummins fancied that he already began to see signs of the transformation in Melisse. She was passionately fond of the gaudy things Maballa gave her, which was a sign of savagery. She was charmed by confinement in the papoose-sling, which was another sign of it; and she had not died in the snow-wallows which was still another.
Maballa was her name, Rookie had told him, and she understood and could talk English better than her son. Billy told her of the condition in the cabin, and when he had finished she took a small pack from the sledge, cackled a few words to Indian Joe, and followed him without a moment's hesitation. That she had no fear of the plague added to Billy's feeling of relief.
He went out into the snow, and found half a dozen other snow-wallows in which the helpless Melisse had taken her chilling baths. He watched Maballa with a new growing terror, and fifty times a day he said to her: "Melisse ees not papoose! She ees ceevilize lak HER!" And he would point to the lonely grave under the guardian spruce. At last Maballa went into an ecstasy of understanding.
Oh, what a glorious time we'll have!" "Perhaps he would go with us," suggested Rod. "No, he couldn't leave the Post. If he went Wabi would have to stay." Rod was counting on his fingers. "That means six in our next expedition, Wabi, Mukoki, John Ball and myself, and you and Maballa. Why, it'll be a regular picnic party!" Minnetaki's eyes were brimming with fun.
"She ees not papoose! She mus' be lak HER!" His great eyes shone, and Cummins felt a thickening in his throat as he looked into them and saw what the boy meant. "Maballa mak papoose out of Melisse. She grow know not'ing, lak papoose, talk lak papoose " Jan's feelings overwhelmed his tongue.
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