against his.

"That won't do!" he chided gently. "Look!" He stood her on her feet before
him, and took her arms at the elbows, pinioning them carefully to her
sides. Then he slowly lifted her above him, so that he had to raise his
face to look into hers. The act was performed as if it were a rite.

"You mean ... I am helpless?" She checked the manifestation of grief as
abruptly as a child does when its mind has been swiftly diverted.

"God bless me, no! I mean anything but that. That's just what I _don't_
mean. I mean that you're to have all the help you want--that you're to
look to me for your strength, that you are to put your burdens on me." He
placed her on the seat beside him and took one of her hands in both his.
"There, now, we'll talk. You see, we're one, you and I. That isn't just a
saying of the preachers. It's a fact. I couldn't harm you without harming
myself. Don't you see that? Nobody could harm you without harming me,
too."

He did not notice that her hand stiffened in his at those words.

"When we've been together awhile we'll both realize in wonderful ways what
it means really to be united. When you've laid your head on my shoulder a
great many times, or against my heart, the very blood in my veins will be
the blood in your veins. I can't explain it. It goes beyond physiology.
We'll belong to each other so completely that wherever you go I shall be
with you, and when I go to work I shall have only to put my hand on my
breast to touch you. I'll get my strength from you, and it shall be yours
again in return. There, those are things which will come to us little by
little. But you must never be afraid."

I would rather not even try to surmise what was in Sylvia's mind when,
following those words of his, she swiftly took his face in her hands with
unsuspected strength and hungrily kissed him. But Harboro read no dark
meaning into the caress. It seemed to him the natural thing for her to
do.

CHAPTER IV

Harboro adopted the plan, immediately after his marriage, of walking to
his work in the morning and back to his home in the evening. It was only a
matter of a mile or so, and if you kept out of the sun of midday, it was a
pleasant enough form of exercise. Indeed, in the morning it was the sort
of thing a man of varied experiences might have been expected to enjoy:
the walk through Eagle Pass, with a glimpse of the Dolch hotel bus going
to meet the early train from Spofford Junction, and a fr