Then a wood carver from that village came to the chief and offered to carve an image of the wife who had died. He was a skilled at making the totem poles and masks for that clan and knew the ways of Shagoon, the spirit beings and ancestors. The carver said, "I have seen your wife. I have seen the two of you walking together. If you will allow me, I would like to carve her image." The young chief agreed.

The carver took a piece of red cedar and began working on it. The carver made a likeness of the wife. Then he dressed it in the same fashion as the wife had dressed.

When he was finished, he went to the young chief and said, "Now you can come and have a look."

When the chief went inside the carver's hut, he saw his wife sitting there just as she always looked. He was very happy.

"What do I owe you for making this?" he asked the carver.

"It is because I felt badly for you that I made it. Do not pay me too much." But the chief paid him well.

The chief took the statue home and dressed it in his wife's clothes and put her marten-skin robe over the shoulders. He felt that his wife had come back to him. He talked to the image and treated it just as he had treated his wife.

One day as he was sitting very close to the image, he felt it move. He thought it must just be his imagination. But still he was not sure and every day he went back and examined it closely. He thought that at some time it would come to life.

After a while, members of the village came to see the image. Many could not believe it was not the woman herself until they had examined it closely.

The image became more and more alive in the imagination of the young chief even though it did not move or speak. Then one day it gave forth a sound from its chest and the chief knew that it must be ill. When he moved it from its place, they found a small cedar-tree growing from the floor. They left it there to grow.

Every day the image of the young woman appeared to be more like a human being. People from other villages heard the story and came to see the statue and the cedar tree growing near it. They were astonished. In all this time the statue never moved or talked very much but the husband began dreaming about what she wanted to tell him. She became alive in his dreams. In this way the chief was healed and his sadness passed.

That cedar tree beside the statue became a very large tree. It is because of this that the cedars on the Queen Charlotte Islands are said to be so good. When people there look for red cedar trees and find a good one, they say, "This looks like the baby of the chief's wife."