was stiff and sore; the
branches of fir under her hurt her through the canvas and one blanket
which covered them. She turned, twisting into a position of less
discomfort. The creek babbled and splashed; its voice merged with the
wilds into a bleak, cheerless duet.

She lifted her head a little; the fire was dying out and King had gone!
The darkness bore down upon her; she heard everywhere vague sounds,
noises as of stealthy feet. She knew a moment of blind terror; she tried
to cry out but only a little choking gasp resulted. She saw something
moving, a vague, formless, dreadful something, and lay back, chilled
with fright. It was King; he was bringing fresh fuel. She sank back and
again looked up at the pines swaying against the field of stars. She
began to shiver; a nervous chill. She felt the slow tears form and spill
over and trickle down her cheeks. She gathered her nether lip between
her teeth and lay very still, shaken now and then by a noiseless sob.

She existed through a period of suppressed excitement. If King found
cool logic eluding him, Gloria's mind was an orgy of nervous imaginings.
She was back with her mother, weeping, sobbing out upon a comforting
breast all of her hideous adventures; she was reading the tall headlines
in the newspapers; she was commenting on them with simulated flippancy
to Georgia and Ernestine; she was meeting Mr. Gratton for the first time
again, treating him to such haughty disdain as put hot blood into his
white face; she was standing erect in the morning, confronting Mark King
fearlessly, demanding her rights, commanding that he take her home. And,
piteously lonely and frightened, she was longing to have him come to her
now, to put his arms about her, to hold her tight, to set his fearless
body between hers and the vague and terrible menaces of the night and
the jeering night voices. She heard a twig snap; her heart beat wildly;
she wondered what she would do when he came--and she saw that he sat
motionless by the fire.

The night wore on. She dozed now and then, fitfully, awakened always
rudely by unaccustomed noises or by the cold or the discomfort of her
bed. She put her hand to her cheek, wondering if she were going to be
feverish; her face was cold. She saw that King had lighted his pipe. She
wanted to scream at him. How she hated him for that. That he could smoke
while she lay here in such wretchedness made her briefly hot with anger.
He was a man, and sweepingly she to