ne. That morning he made some vague excuse to Shearer and set out
blindly down the river.

He did not know where he was going, any more than did the bull moose
plunging through the trackless wilderness to his mate. Instinct,
the instinct of all wild natural creatures, led him. And so, without
thought, without clear intention even,--most would say by accident,--he
saw her again. It was near the "pole trail"; which was less like a trail
than a rail-fence.

For when the snows are deep and snowshoes not the property of every man
who cares to journey, the old-fashioned "pole trail" comes into use. It
is merely a series of horses built of timber across which thick Norway
logs are laid, about four feet from the ground, to form a continuous
pathway. A man must be a tight-rope walker to stick to the pole trail
when ice and snow have sheathed its logs. If he makes a misstep, he
is precipitated ludicrously into feathery depths through which he must
flounder to the nearest timber horse before he can remount. In summer,
as has been said, it resembles nothing so much as a thick one-rail fence
of considerable height, around which a fringe of light brush has grown.

Thorpe reached the fringe of bushes, and was about to dodge under the
fence, when he saw her. So he stopped short, concealed by the leaves and
the timber horse.

She stood on a knoll in the middle of a grove of monster pines. There
was something of the cathedral in the spot. A hush dwelt in the dusk,
the long columns lifted grandly to the Roman arches of the frond, faint
murmurings stole here and there like whispering acolytes. The girl stood
tall and straight among the tall, straight pines like a figure on an
ancient tapestry. She was doing nothing--just standing there--but the
awe of the forest was in her wide, clear eyes.

The great sweet feeling clutched the young man's throat again. But
while the other,--the vision of the frost-work glade and the spirit-like
figure of silence,--had been unreal and phantasmagoric, this was of the
earth. He looked, and looked, and looked again. He saw the full pure
curve of her cheek's contour, neither oval nor round, but like the
outline of a certain kind of plum. He appreciated the half-pathetic
downward droop of the corners of her mouth,--her red mouth in dazzling,
bewitching contrast to the milk-whiteness of her skin. He caught the
fineness of her nose, straight as a Grecian's, but with some faint
suggestion about the nostrils t