"Cousin," said Wassamo, "some person is near us. I hear a laugh; awake and let us look out!"
The cousin made no answer.
Again Wassamo heard the laughter in mirthful repetition, like the ripple of the water-brook upon the shining pebbles of the stream. Peering out as far as the line of the torchlight pierced into the darkness, he beheld two beautiful young females smiling on him. Their countenances appeared to be perfectly white, like the fresh snow.
He crouched down and pushed his cousin, saying, in a low voice, "Awake! awake! here are two young women."
But he received no answer. His cousin seemed lost to all earthly sense and sound; for he lay unmoved, smiling, in the calm light of the moon. Wassamo started up alone, and glided toward the strange females.
As he approached them he was more and more enraptured with their beauty; but just as he was about to speak to them, he suddenly fell to the earth, and they all three vanished together. The moon shone where they had just stood, but she saw them not. A gentle sound of music and soft voices accompanied their vanishing, and this wakened the cousin.
As he opened his eyes, in a dreamy way, he saw the kettle near him. Some of the fish he observed were in the bowl. The fire flickered, and made light and shadow; but nowhere was Wassamo to be seen. He waited, and waited again, in the expectation that Wassamo would appear.
"Perhaps," thought the cousin, "he is gone out again to visit the nets."
He looked off that way, but the canoe still lay close by the rock at the shore. He searched and found his footsteps in the ashes, and out upon the green ground a little distance, and then they were utterly lost.
He was now greatly troubled in spirit, and he called aloud, "Netawis! cousin! cousin!" but there was no answer to his call. He called again in his sorrow, louder and louder, "Netawis! Netawis! cousin! cousin! whither are you gone?" But no answer came to his voice of wailing. He started for the edge of the woods, crying as he ran, "My cousin!" and "Oh, my cousin!"