, and a chill passing over his body like an icy
hand, beginning at his feet and working up to his head. Shivering and
with teeth chattering, he would raise himself up on his elbow, only to
see that the wood was again burnt through and that the fire was going
out.

At last he determined to give up the attempt to sleep. Pulling a box
near the stove and using it as a back-rest, he gathered his blankets
tightly round him and lit his pipe.

Across his shoulders, through the window behind him, fell a shaft of
moonlight; in front of him, dazzling his eyes, was the redness of the
glowing charcoal, and the yellow of the jumping flames; within
hand-stretch to the right lay Spurling, with his feet toward the fire
and his head within six inches of the threshold. In the great
stillness which was outside, nothing was to be heard save the rustling
of the snow as it bound tighter, and the occasional low booming of the
trees as the frost, acting on the sap, bent their branches.

With his accustomed passion for fairness, he commenced to examine his
dealings with Peggy and to try to regard his actions from her
view-point. In his recent conversation with her she had revealed
qualities the existence of which he had not suspected; he had not
reckoned her at her true worth. He began to be uncertain even now as
to whether he was doing right in leaving her. Perhaps she, for all her
ignorance, was wiser than himself. But of one thing she had made him
certain, that of all creatures which walked, and talked, and ate, and
drank, upon the earth, she alone stood by him in his crisis for an
unselfish reason, and loved him for himself. He knew now, though he
had not realised it until that night, that he loved her in return,
half-breed though she was, and could not do without her. He was
willing to own to himself that, in his treatment of her, he had not
always been just and, because of her race, at times had been
despising. He'd been more or less of a fool, and had refused a good
deal of available happiness.

He looked towards the door; if it had not been for the unpleasantness
of awaking Spurling, he would have gone at once to the shack and said
to her, "I don't mind who you are, I love you better than any white
girl, and would prefer you from amongst them all, were I again given
my choice." Before he set out, he would like to have her believe that
he was going, at least partly, for her sake.

The smoke from the burning wood made his eyes grow h