That was the beginning of the real tragedy at the post.  The wilderness is a grim oppressor of life.  To those who survive in it the going out of life is but an incident, an irresistible and natural thing, unpleasant but without horror.  So it was with the passing of Cummins.  But the Englishman brought with him something new, as the woman had brought something new, only in this instance it was an element of life which Jan and his people could not understand, an element which had never found a place, and never could, in the hearts and souls of the post.  On the other hand, it promised to be but an incident to the Englishman, a passing adventure in pleasure common to the high and glorious civilization from which he had come.  Here again was that difference of viewpoint, the eternity of difference between the middle and the end of the earth.  As the days passed, and the crust grew deeper upon the “Beeg Snows,” the tragedy progressed rapidly toward finality.  At first Jan did not understand.  The others did not understand.  When the worm of the Englishman’s sin revealed itself it struck them with a dumb, terrible fear.

The Englishman came from among women.  For months he had been in a torment of desolation.  Cummins’ wife was to him like a flower suddenly come to relieve the tantalizing barrenness of a desert, and with the wiles and soft speech of his kind he sought to breathe its fragrance.  In the weeks that followed the flower seemed to come nearer to him, and this was because Jan and his people had not as yet fully measured the heart of the woman, and because the Englishman had not measured Jan and his people he talked a great deal when enthused by the warmth of the box stove and his thoughts.  So human passions were set at play.  Because the woman knew nothing of what was said about the box stove she continued in the even course of her pure life, neither resisting nor encouraging the newcomer, yet ever tempting him with that sweetness which she gave to all alike, and still praying in the still hours of night that Cummins would return to her.  As yet there was no suspicion in her soul.  She accepted the Englishman’s friendship.  His sympathy for her won him a place in her recognition of things good and true.  She did not hear the false note, she saw no step that promised evil.  Only Jan and his people saw and understood the one-sided struggle, and shivered at the monstrous evil of it.  At least they thought they saw and understood, which was enough.  Like so many faithful beasts they were ready to spring, to rend flesh, to tear life out of him who threatened the desecration of all that was good and pure and beautiful to them, and yet, dumb in their devotion and faith, they waited and watched for a sign from the woman.  The blue eyes of Cummins’ wife, the words of her gentle lips, the touch of her hands had made law at the post.  She, herself, had become the omniscience of all that was law to them, and if she smiled upon the Englishman, and talked with him, and was pleased with him, that was only one other law that she had made for them to respect.  So they were quiet, evaded the Englishman as much as possible, and watched—­always watch ed.