t the world.

As he grew calmer his reason began to dissect the scene that had taken
place in the store, and he wondered whether she had been lying to him,
after all. No doubt she had been engaged to the Frenchman, and had
always planned to wed Poleon, for that was not out of reason; she might
even have set out mischievously to amuse herself with him, but at the
recollection of those rapturous hours they had spent together, he
declared aloud that she had loved him, and him only. Every instinct in
him shouted that she loved him, in spite of her cruel protestations.

All that afternoon he stayed locked in his room, and during those
solitary hours he came to know his own soul. He saw what life meant:
what part love plays in it, how dwarfed and withered all things are
when pitted against it.

A man came with his supper, but he called to him to be gone. The night
settled slowly, and with the darkness came such a feeling of despair
and lonesomeness that Burrell lighted every lamp and candle in the
place to dispel, in some measure, the gloom that had fallen upon him.
There are those who believe that in passing from daylight to darkness a
subtle transition occurs akin to the change from positive to negative
in an electrical current, and that this intangible, untraceable
atmospheric influence exerts a definite, psychical effect upon men and
their modes of thought. Be this as it may, it is certain that as the
night grew darker the Lieutenant's mood changed. He lost his fierce
anger at the girl, and reasoned that he owed it to her to set himself
right in her eyes; that in all justice to her he ought to prove his own
sincerity, and assure her that whatever her own state of mind had been,
she wronged him when she said he had made sport of her for his own
pleasure. She might then dismiss him and proceed with her marriage, but
first she must know this much of the truth at least. So he argued,
insensible to the sophistry of his reasoning, which was in reality
impelled by the hunger to see her and hear her voice again. He snatched
his hat and bolted out, almost running in his eagerness.

An up-river steamboat was just landing as he neared the trading-post--a
freighter, as he noted by her lights. In the glare at the river-bank he
saw Poleon and the trader, who had evidently returned from Lee's Creek,
and without accosting them he hurried on to the store. Peering in from
the darkness, he saw Alluna; no doubt Necia was alone in the hous