floor covered most of the space, save
for a few boxes. Outside the doors were the ashes of old fires.

"Well, it's _something_," said Johnny in glum resignation. "Hasn't the
fool that built it any food?"

Vigorously he poked about the tiny place, then emerged to report in
disgust, "Not a darn thing. . . . Oh, well, it's a shelter, anyway."

The incredible idea pierced Maria Angelina that he was going to pause
there for rest.

"Oh, we must go on," she insisted.

"Go on?" He turned to stare in indignation at the girl who had gasped
that at him. "Go on? In this dark? When it's going to rain? Why, you're
nearly all in, now."

"Indeed--indeed, I am not all in," she protested. "It is not necessary
for me to rest--not necessary at all. I am quite strong. I want only to
go on--to go to the Lodge----"

"We'll never make the Lodge to-night. We'll have to camp here the best
way we can."

It seemed to her that she could hardly have heard him. It was so
incredible a thought--so overwhelming----

A queer gulping sound came from her throat. Her words fell without her
volition, like spent breaths.

"But that is wrong. We cannot stay. We cannot stay like that----"

"Why can't we stay?"

"It--it is impossible! The scandal----"

Angrily he wheeled about. "Scandal?" he said sharply. "What the hell
scandal is there?"

His indignation at the words could not dispel her terror. But it was
something to have him so hot her champion.

"You know, they will all talk----"

"Let 'em talk," he said curtly. "We can't help it."

She put a hand to her throat as if to still that throbbing pulse there
that impeded speech.

"I know we cannot help it. But we cannot--not give them so much to talk
of. We can be trying to return----"

"Don't be a goose, Ri-Ri!" he broke in sharply.

He was a man. He did not understand the full agony. . . . Desperately
Maria Angelina wondered as to her reception. She had no parallel in
Italian society. The thing could not happen in Italian society. A girl,
a well born girl, rambling the woods all night with her fiance!

She wondered if the announcement of their engagement instantly upon
their return would appease the world. Of course, there would always be
the story. As long as she lived there would be the story. But as
Johnny's wife, triumphant, assured, she could afford to ignore it.

At her stillness Johnny had looked about, and something infinitely
drooping and forlorn in the vague outlines of h