n wall entered through a narrow door made of saplings that were
still green. He noticed that the partition was also made of fresh
timber. Except for the bunk built against the wall, a crude chair, a
sapling table and half a dozen bear skins that carpeted the floor the
room was empty. A few garments hung on the wall--a hood made of fur, a
thick mackinaw coat belted at the waist with a red scarf, and something
done up in a small bundle.

"I guess--I begin to get your meaning," he said, looking straight into
her shining blue eyes. "You want to impress on me that I'm not to wring
Bram Johnson's neck when his back is turned, or at any other time, and
you want me to believe that he hasn't done you any harm. And yet you're
afraid to the bottom of your soul. I know it. A little while ago your
face was as white as chalk, and now--now--it's the prettiest face I've
ever seen. Now, see here, little girl--"

It gave him a pleasant thrill to see the glow in her eyes and the eager
poise of her slim, beautiful body as she listened to him.

"I'm licked," he went on, smiling frankly at her. "At least for the
present. Maybe I've gone loony, like Bram, and don't realize it yet. I
set out for a couple of Indians, and find a madman; and at the madman's
cabin I find YOU, looking at first as though you were facing straight
up against the door of-of-well, seeing that you can't understand I
might as well say it--OF HELL! Now, if you weren't afraid of Bram, and
if he hasn't hurt you, why did you look like that? I'm stumped. I
repeat it--dead stumped. I'd give a million dollars if I could make
Bram talk. I saw what was in his eyes. YOU saw it--and that pretty pink
went out of your face so quick it seemed as though your heart must have
stopped beating. And yet you're trying to tell me he hasn't harmed you.
My God--I wish I could believe it!"

In her face he saw the reflection of the change that must have come
suddenly into his own.

"You're a good fifteen hundred miles from any other human being with
hair and eyes and color like yours," he continued, as though in
speaking his thoughts aloud to her some ray of light might throw itself
on the situation. "If you had something black about you. But you
haven't. You're all gold--pink and white and gold. If Bram has another
fit of talking he may tell me you came from the moon--that a
chasse-galere crew brought you down out of space to keep house for him.
Great Scott, can't you give me some sort of an