Mr. Feversham. I told it at the clubhouse the
night he was in Seattle."

"It's impossible to explain; you never could understand." She sat erect,
but Tisdale felt her body tremble, and she went on swiftly, with little
breaks and catches: "You don't know the hold your story has on me. I've
dreamed it all over at night; I've wakened cold and wet with perspiration
from head to foot, as though I--too--were struggling through those frozen
solitudes. I've been afraid to sleep sometimes, the dread of facing--it--
is so strong."

Watching her, a sudden tenderness rose through the wonder in Tisdale's
face.

"So you dreamed you were fighting it through with me; that's strange. But
I see the story was too hard for you; Feversham shouldn't have told it."
He paused and his brows clouded. "I wish I could make Weatherbee's wife
dream it," he broke out. "It might teach her what he endured. I have gone
over the ground with her in imagination, mile after mile, that long trek
from Nome. I have seen her done for, whimpering in a corner, like the
weakest husky in the team, there at the Aurora mine, and at her limit
again up in Rainy Pass. And once lately, the night of the club supper,
while I was lying awake in my room, looking off through the window to the
harbor lights and the stars, I heard her crying deeply from the heart. She
did not seem like herself then, but a different woman I was mighty sorry
for."

Miss Armitage turned and met his look, questioning, hardly comprehending.
"That sounds occult," she said.

"Does it? Well, perhaps it is. But a man who has lived in the big spaces
has his senses sharpened. He sees farther; feels more."

There was a silent moment. The colts, topping a low dune, felt the
pressure of the fills on the down-grade, and the nigh horse broke, turning
the front wheel into a tangle of sage. "Mr. Tisdale," she cried a little
tremulously, "do you think this is a catboat, tacking into a squall?
Please, please let me drive."

Her effort was supreme. It relieved the tension, and when the change was
made, she drew to the edge of the seat, holding her head high like that
intrepid flower to which he had compared her.

"You mean," she said evenly, "the terrible silence of your big spaces keys
up the subjective mind. That, of course, was the trouble with Mrs.
Barbour's husband. He allowed it to dominate him. But a man like you"--and
she gave him her swift, direct look, and the shadow of a smile touched her
mouth