CHAPTER VI 



A WELCOME 



So the village grew. Close to the brook, and all 

 along the line of the beach, the Eskimos built their 

 huts ; and when all the line of the beach was filled 

 they straggled up the hillside. First they were huts 

 of turf, like the old heathen homes ; but as years 

 passed little homes of wood sprang up, with boarded 

 floors and windows to let the sunshine in, and clean- 

 liness began to take the place of the gloom and filth 

 of heathen days. And this was the village, this 

 village of Okak, in which I set foot more than a 

 hundred and thirty years after the first villagers had 

 trodden the path across the ridge of the island to 

 build their homes by the brook, 



I was sitting in my little room on one of my first 

 days there when there came a timid tap at the door. 

 A very timid tap it was, hardly enough to rouse me 

 from my writing, and I had to pause and listen 

 awhile before I was sure that there had been a tap 

 at all. It came again, the gentle tapping of fingers, 

 and this time the door slowly opened and a wrinkled 

 old face came peeping round. A pair of old eyes 

 blinked a little at the sudden light ; then the door 

 opened a little wider, and in came Ruth. 



Although I was a newcomer I knew her well. 

 She had stood among the crowd upon the jetty to 

 meet the boat when I landed ; she had pressed for- 



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