e trail that the sun never shines on."

And so the two men sat and talked, feeding the camp fire with sticks
occasionally as they talked. They wondered who the man was and whence
he came, wondered if he would change his views and if the girl could win
him over to a rational way of looking at the deed that had been done and
the true way to atone for it; wondered if they could not assist her in
her loving task when the morning came; talked and wondered and planned,
and at last, wrapping their blankets around them, they laid down to
sleep. The last words spoken were by the Trapper, and were these:

"We will go over in the mornin', Herbert, and help the girl."

And then they slept.

* * * * *

Beyond the balsam thicket, by another camp fire, the girl and the man
sat talking, talking of the deed that had been done and the atonement
demanded, and of the great future beyond this present life; the future
that stretches away endlessly, the future of peace to some, perhaps to
all, who knows? For there be some who think that this life has in it
such forces of education, such enlightenment to the understanding, such
quickening to the conscience, such ripening of character; and that
through its experiences, its trials, and its griefs, come such graces to
the souls of those that leave it, that when they pass they leave their
worse self behind them, even as the germ leaves the shuck out of which
it sprouted,--leaves the dull, clamp ground forever while it groweth up
into the sunlight in which it finds perfection.

"Mary," said the man, "I have done with the past. My mind turns wholly
toward the future. I see it as the shipwrecked sailor sees the land,
which, if he can but reach, he will not only be beyond the storm that
wrecks him, but beyond all storms forever. Companion of my joys and
companion of my grief,--companion in everything but in my sin,--counsel
with me, with your eyes turned ahead. You are innocent and innocence is
prophetic. What lies beyond this world and the life men live in it? What
of good waits for him who gives up this life bravely and penitently, and
trusts himself to the decisions and the certainties of the great
hereafter?"

"My master," said the girl, "it is not for me to teach you, you who are
so much greater than I, you who have been gifted with faculties and
powers that have lifted you above men. What can I say to you save to
repeat what you have said to me?"

"Mary,"