ples did not play. The little flower paled, the small
face grew smaller, the tiny hands tinier; and one morning, when the
birds awoke in the forests of the Squamish, the eyes of the little
Tenas Klootchman remained closed.

They put her to sleep under the giant cedars, the lulling, singing
firs, the whispering pines that must now be her lullaby, instead of
her mother's voice crooning the child-songs of the Pacific, that
tell of baby foxes and gamboling baby wolves and bright-eyed baby
birds. Nothing remained to Maarda but an empty little cradle
basket, but smoothly-folded silken "blankets," but disused beaded
bands. Often at nightfall she would stand alone, and watch the sun
dip into the far waters, leaving the world as gray and colorless
as her own life; she would outstretch her arms--pitifully empty
arms--towards the west, and beneath her voice again croon the
lullabies of the Pacific, telling of the baby foxes, the soft,
furry baby wolves, and the little downy fledglings in the nests.
Once in an agony of loneliness she sang these things aloud, but her
husband heard her, and his face turned gray and drawn, and her soul
told her she must not be heard again singing these things aloud.

And one evening a little steamer came into harbor. Many Indians
came ashore from it, as the fishing season had begun. Among others
was a young woman over whose face the finger of illness had traced
shadows and lines of suffering. In her arms she held a baby, a
beautiful, chubby, round-faced, healthy child that seemed too heavy
for her wasted form to support. She looked about her wistfully,
evidently seeking a face that was not there, and as the steamer
pulled out of the harbor, she sat down weakly on the wharf, laid
the child across her lap, and buried her face in her hands. Maarda
touched her shoulder.

"Who do you look for?" she asked.

"For my brother Luke 'Alaska,'" replied the woman. "I am ill, my
husband is dead, my brother will take care of me; he's a good man."

"Luke 'Alaska,'" said Maarda. What had she heard of Luke "Alaska?"
Why, of course, he was one of the men her own husband had taken a
hundred miles up the coast as axeman on a surveying party, but she
dared not tell this sick woman. She only said: "You had better come
with me. My husband is away, but in a day of two he will be able to
get news to your brother. I'll take care of you till they come."

The woman arose gratefully, then swayed unsteadily under the weight