ge woman in the hut. He was innocent there, he was unthinking, he
didn't know what tale his eyes told of him. It wasn't earthly passion
they told. She had seen many things in her tumultuous life of the last
few years, this woman he called a child. The eyes told how his soul was
going down in a wreckage of worship of the charm that blooms in a few
women only, translated to him through the pity of this woman's wretched
state. Should she interpret him to himself? She could, without
offending. Rookie was sensitive to see, and she found her hand steady to
hold the torch. But there she saw herself slipping into Aunt Anne's
mandatory attitude, choking, dominating, sapping him, heart and brain.
It mustn't be done. It shouldn't. Rookie had had enough of spiritual
government. Above all, she wanted him to have his life: not the sterile
monotony of a man who renounced and served and deferred to managing
females.

Had the woman any soul in her? If Rookie kidnaped her (and the child, it
would have to be, the doubtful child) would she pay in love for love, or
only an uncomprehending worship? One thing Nan had determined on, the
minute she opened her door to him this night and saw the quick concern
in his face and heard his tone in greeting: Rookie should feel there was
somebody in this disordered world who plainly adored him. If he could
believe that the better for her putting her cheek on his and loving him
to death, he should have it. Rookie should feel warm. As for her, she
was cold. She shivered there by the window and knew it was the inner
tremor of her nerves, for the fire still leaped and the room was
pulsing. "The amount of it is," said Nan to herself, "my heart's broken.
Oh, hang Aunt Anne!" Then she remembered Aunt Anne was dead. But she
would not have recalled the little missile hurled at the impalpable
ghost through the shade of removedness that enveloped her. Nan was
inexorable in standing for what she saw.

In the morning she found the fires burning below stairs and her tray set
out, with cup and plate. Charlotte had gone. Nan felt the mounting of
spirit due a healthy body, with the new day, and made her toast and her
coffee with a great sense of the pleasure of it all. There was one
drawback. It was distinctly "no fair" to let Charlotte come over to
companion her at night when there was so much to do with the exigent
Amelia on board. But that must settle itself. If she could get Tira
(whom she also called "the woman" i