this time."

"Pierre--and I----"

"But you have grown so tall--so strange--I can hardly feel----"

"And you--so stern and old."

"I never dreamed I could love anything more than the little girl who
lay in the snow, and died there that night."

"And I never dreamed I could smile at any man except the boy who lay by
me that night. And he died."

"What miracle saved you?"

She said: "It was wonderful, and yet very simple. You remember how the
tree crushed me down into the snow? Well, when the landslide moved, it
carried the tree before it; the weight of the trunk was lifted from me.
Perhaps it was a rock that struck me over the head then, for I lost
consciousness. The slide didn't bury me, but the rush carried me
before it like a stick before a wave, you see.

"When I woke I was almost completely covered with a blanket of debris,
but I could move my arms, and managed to prop myself up in a sitting
posture. It was there that my father and his searching party found me;
he had been combing that district all night. They carried me back,
terribly bruised, but without even a bone broken. It was a miracle
that I escaped, and the miracle must have been worked by your cross; do
you remember?"

He shuddered and threw a hand up before his eyes.

"Dearest----"

"It's nothing--but the cross--for every good fortune it has brought me,
it has brought bad luck to others."

"Hush, Pierre. Put your arms around me. I am all yours--all. You
must not think of the trouble or the cross."

He obeyed and drew her close to him, and the warm slender body gave to
him and lay close against his; and her head went back, and the curve of
her soft lips was close to his. He kissed her, reverently, and then,
with passion, the lips, the eyes, the throat, that quivered as if she
were singing.

"Pierre, I have said good night to you every time before I went to
sleep all these years."

"And I've looked for you in the face of every woman."

"And I used to think that a still, small voice answered me out of the
night."

"Oh, my dear, there was a voice; for I've loved you so hard that it
must have been like a hand at your shoulder tapping, and asking you to
remember me. Mary, you are crying."

"I'm so happy; I can't help it. It's as if--as if--Pierre----"

"Dear, my dear."

"Hold me closer. I want to feel your strength around me, so that I
know I can never lose you again."

"Never."

"Tell me again that you love me."

"