Young Williams, the factor's son, followed after
Cummins, and the rest of the company's men went into the south and
east.
The exodus left desolate lifelessness at the post. The windows of the
fireless cabins were thick with clinging frost. There was no movement
in the factor's office. The dogs were gone, and wolves and lynx
sniffed closer each night. In the oppression of this desertion, the
few Indian and half-breed children kept indoors, and Williams'
Chippewayan wife, fat and lazy, left the company's store securely
locked.
In this silence and lifelessness Jan Thoreau felt a new and ever-
increasing happiness. To him the sound of life was a thing vibrant
with harshness; quiet--the dead, pulseless quiet of lifelessness--was
beautiful. 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. His face was aflame with a great, absorbing
passion which at other times he concealed. His beautiful eyes glowed
with hidden fires, and he whispered soothing, singsong things to the
child, and played softly upon his violin, leaning his black head far
down so that the baby Melisse could clutch her appreciative fingers in
his hair.
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