e: he did this most private,
so that no one saw but the girl.

"At last the time was come. The Lake was all rose and gold out there in
the west, and the water so still so still. The cool, moist scent of the
leaves and grass came out from the woods and up from the plain, and the
world was so full of content that a man's heart could cry out, even as
now, while we look--eh, is it not good? See the deer drinking on
the other shore there!" Suddenly Pierre became silent, as if he had
forgotten the story altogether. Tybalt was impatient, but he did not
speak. He took a twig, and in the sand he wrote "Charles Rex." Pierre
glanced down and saw it.

"There was beating of the little drums," he continued, "and the crying
of the king's speaker; and soon all was ready, and the people gathered
at a distance, and the king and the queen, and the chief men nearer; and
the girl was brought forth.

"As they led her past the Great Slave, she looked into his eyes, and
afterwards her heart was glad, for she knew that at the last he would be
near her, and that his hand should light the fires. Two men tied her to
the stake. Then the king's man cried out again, telling of her crime,
and calling for her death. The Great Slave was brought near. No one knew
that the palms of his hands had been rubbed in the sand for a purpose.
When he was brought beside the stake, a torch was given him by his
guards. He looked at the girl, and she smiled at him, and said:
'Good-bye. Forgive. I die not afraid, and happy.'

"He did not answer, but stooped and lit the sticks here and there. All
at once he snatched a burning stick, and it and the torch he thrust,
like lightning, in the faces of his guards, blinding them. Then he
sprang to the stake, and, with a huge pull, tore it from the ground,
girl and all, and rushed to the shore of the Lake, with her tied so in
his arms.

"He had been so swift that, at first, no one stirred. He reached the
shore, rushed into the water, dragging a boat out with one hand as he
did so, and, putting the girl in, seized a paddle and was away with a
start. A few strokes, and then he stopped, picked up a hatchet that was
in the boat with many spears, and freed the girl. Then he paddled on,
trusting, with a small hope, that through his great strength he could
keep ahead till darkness came, and then, in the gloom, they might
escape. The girl also seized an oar, and the canoe--the king's own
canoe--came on like a swallow.

"But the