The dawn was breaking. She lit the spirit-lamp and crouched beside it, graceful and brooding, her nightdress spread on the floor about her like a train of snow.
"I'll chill you a drop o milk," she said in her deep voice, with the coo of comfort in it. "It comes over cold towards dawn."
He drank readily and seemed refreshed.
"That's better," he said.
Ruth watched him with kind eyes.
"Now you'll sleep, I reck'n," she said.
"Ruth," he answered, "come here."
She came.
He took her hand and kissed it.
"That's all," he said. "Thank you. Good-night."