k her pain without wincing, without complaint, and when he
seemed to need her in any little way, in any big way, she gave because
she could not help it, because she had promised him largesse, because
it was her nature to give. Besides, although she was instinctively
waiting, she did not foresee the end.

It was in late October when, somewhere in the pile of Prosper's mail,
there lay a small gray envelope. Joan drew his attention to it,
calling it a "queer little letter," and he took it up slowly as though
his deft and nervous fingers had gone numb. Before he opened it he
looked at Joan and, in one sense, it was the last time he ever did
look at her; for at that moment his stark spirit looked straight into
hers, acknowledged its guilt, and bade her a mute and remorseful
farewell.

He read and Joan watched. His face grew pale and bright as though some
electric current had been turned into his veins; his eyes, looking up
from the writing, but not returning to her, had the look given by some
drug which is meant to stupefy, but which taken in an overdose
intoxicates. He turned and made for the door, holding the little gray
folded paper in his hand. On the threshold he half-faced her without
lifting his eyes.

"I have had extraordinary news, Joan. I shall have to go off alone and
think things out. I don't know when I shall get back." He went out and
shut the door gently.

Joan stood listening. She heard him go along the passage and through
the second door. She heard his feet on the mountain trail. Afterwards
she went out and stood between the two sentinel firs that had marked
the entrance to that snow-tunnel long since disappeared. Now it was a
late October day, bright as a bared sword. The flowers of the Indian
paint-brush burned like red candle flames everywhere under the firs,
the fire-weed blazed, the aspen leaves were laid like little golden
tiles against the metallic blue of the sky. The high peak pointed up
dizzily and down, down dizzily into the clear emptiness of the lake.
This great peak stood there in the glittering stillness of the day. A
grouse boomed, but Joan was not startled by the sudden rush of its
wings. She felt the sharp weight of that silent mountain in her heart;
she might have been buried under it. So she felt it all day while she
worked, a desperate, bright day,--hideous in her memory,--and at night
she lay waiting. After hours longer than any other hours, the door of
her bedroom opened and an ob