ad on the table. His back seemed
broken. His legs were numb, and hurt when he stepped on them. He swung
his arms a little to bring back circulation, and rubbed his hands over
the fire that began to crackle in the stove.

It was the sickness that had overcome him--he knew that. But the
thought of it did not appall him as it had yesterday, and the day
before. There seemed to be something in the cabin now that comforted
and soothed him, something that took away a part of the loneliness that
was driving him mad. Even as he searched about him, peering into the
dark corners and at the bare walls, a word formed on his lips, and he
half smiled. It was a woman's name--Hester. And a warmth entered into
him. The pain left his head. For the first time in weeks he felt
DIFFERENT. And slowly he began to realize what had wrought the change.
He was not alone. A message had come to him from the one who was
waiting for him miles away; something that lived, and breathed, and was
as lonely as himself. It was the little mouse.

He looked about eagerly, his eyes brightening, but the mouse was gone.
He could not hear it. There seemed nothing unusual to him in the words
he spoke aloud to himself.

"I'm going to call it after the Kid," he chuckled, "I'm goin' to call
it Little Jim. I wonder if it's a girl mouse--or a boy mouse?"

He placed a pan of snow-water on the stove and began making his simple
preparations for breakfast. For the first time in many days he felt
actually hungry. And then all at once he stopped, and a low cry that
was half joy and half wonder broke from his lips. With tensely gripped
hands and eyes that shone with a strange light he stared straight at
the blank surface of the log wall--through it--and a thousand miles
away. He remembered THAT day--years ago--the scenes of which came to
him now as though they had been but yesterday. It was afternoon, in the
glorious summer, and he had gone to Hester's home. Only the day before
Hester had promised to be his wife, and he remembered how fidgety and
uneasy and yet wondrously happy he was as he sat out on the big white
veranda, waiting for her to put on her pink muslin dress, which went go
well with the gold of her hair and the blue of her eyes. And as he sat
there, Hester's maltese pet came up the steps, bringing in its jaws a
tiny, quivering brown mouse. It was playing with the almost lifeless
little creature when Hester came through the door.

He heard again the low cry th