most glorious passion as climax to his career? To flee meant endless
fear, torment. To be captured meant defeat, utter and final dismay.

A knock upon the door startled him, and Peggy's voice cut short his
meditation. "You can come in now, Mr. Smith," she said.

The broad crystals were still falling thickly and the fire was hissing
and spluttering around a huge root which he had rolled upon it. In its
light the cabin stood hardly higher than a kennel, and yet it housed the
woman whose glance had transformed his world into something mystical. A
man of commonplace ancestry would have felt only an animal delight in
shelter and warmth, but this youth was stirred to a spiritual
exaltation. The girl's bosom, the rounded beauty of her neck, appealed
to him, but so also did the steady candor of her gaze and the sweet
courage of her lips. Her helplessness roused his protective instinct,
and her words, the sound of her voice, so precise, so alien-sweet,
filled him with bitter sadness, and he re-entered the house in such
spirit of self-abasement as he had never known before.

He lay down upon the hard floor in silence, his audacity gone, his
reckless courage deep-sunk in gloomy foreboding.

Alice, on her part, could not free her mind from the burden of his
crime. He was so young and so handsome, to be hunted like a noxious
beast! She had at the moment more concern of him than of Ward, and in
this lay a certain disloyalty. She sighed deeply as she thought of the
outlaw resuming his flight next day. Would it not be better for him to
sacrifice himself to the vengeance of the state at once and so end it?
What right had she to shield him from the law's demand? "He is a
criminal, after all. He must pay for his rash act."

She could not sleep, and when he rose to feed the fire she softly asked,
"Does it still storm?"

"No," he answered in a tone that voiced disappointment; "the sky is
clear."

"Isn't that cheering!" she exclaimed, still in the same hushed voice.

"For you," he replied. "For me it's another story." He felt the desire
for a secret consultation which moved her, and on his way back to his
corner he halted and fixed his eyes upon her in hungry admiration of her
fire-lit face. Then he spoke: "I should have pulled out before the storm
quit. They can trail me now. But no matter; I've known you."

She still kept to ambiguous speech. "Wouldn't it be better to give up
and take your--misfortune, and begin again? Professor