"They's wonderful fond o' tea, and tobacco, too," explained Bob, "an' they only gets un when they goes t' Ungava onct or twict a year."
Upon Bob's suggestion that, should they meet Indians, it would prove an acceptable gift, Shad had purchased at the post and brought with him a bountiful supply of black plug tobacco, such as the natives used, and with this hint from Bob he gave each of the Indians a half-dozen plugs. The swarthy faces and black eyes of the visitors lighted with pleasure, and from that moment much of the reserve that they had hitherto maintained toward him vanished.
"The friend of White Brother of the Snow is generous," said Sishetakushin, in accepting the tobacco. "For four moons we have had nothing to smoke but dried leaves and the bark of the red willow."
Each Indian carried at his belt a pipe, the bowl fashioned from soft, red pipe stone, the stem a hollow spruce stick. Squatting upon their haunches before the fire, they at once filled their pipes with tobacco, lighted them with coals from the fire, and blissfully puffed in silence for several minutes.
"How are Manikawan and her mother?" Bob presently inquired.
"The mother is well, but the maiden has grieved long because White Brother of the Snow never returns," answered Sishetakushin. "She watches for him when the Spirit of the Wind speaks in the tree-tops. She watches when the moon is bright and the shadow spirits are abroad. She watches when the evil spirits of the storm are raging in fury through the forest. She watches always, and is sad. Young men have sought her hand to wife, but she has denied them. White Brother of the Snow will return. He will come again to our lodge, and the maiden will be joyful."
Shad was unable to understand a word of this, but Bob's face told him plainly that something not altogether pleasant to the lad had been said.
"I cannot go now," said Bob, speaking in the Indian tongue. "We must build our lodges and lay our trails. Winter will soon be upon us and we must have the lodges built before the Frost Spirit freezes the earth."
"Sishetakushin's lodge is always open to White Brother of the Snow. It is pitched upon the shores of the Great Lake, two-days' journey to the northward. The trail is plain. It lies through two lakes and along water running to the Great Lake. The maiden is waiting for White Brother of the Snow. He was made one of our people. He is welcome."
[Footnote: Lake Michikamau, the Great Lake of the Indians, situated on the Labrador plateau.]