"Whether I'm in this misty valley, or up in those scarred rocks 'n' crags—wherever I happen ter be—'n' send my call out ter space, I reckon I've got ter go when the answer comes floatin' back ter me:—whenever a dawn brings two eyes that have been watchin' fer no one else but me, I reckon I've got ter follow in jest that very way! We weren't made ter put up a fight when that call comes—fer that call don't mean fight, Miss Jane; it means surrender!"
"Oh, my mountain poet," she murmured, leaning gracefully nearer, "how can you wear a modern harness with such a soul! But we cannot live simply, as the animals and birds! Do you not see that a higher civilization has taught us the greater meaning of these things?"
"No," he answered bluntly. "That call is the greatest meaning. Nothin' don't stand one, two, three to it! If civilization chokes it, then civilization is wrong!"
A feeling of conflict stirred in her. Here was this towering young god whom the Great Chiseller had made so awkward, so uncontrollably selfish, yet otherwise so fine, and he was deliberately leaving the one path of all others which she had believed him most sure to follow. Ruth had sent him to her untarnished, and now, while in her keeping, he was drifting away! How could she ever answer those blind eyes if they questioned her with their calm, sightless stare? Her hand left his chair and rested lightly on his shoulder, and the voice which spoke to him seemed almost hard:
"You are stumbling into a false reasoning! Civilization does not choke the cry; it only directs the way men and women shall answer! You are not forgetting your Sunlight Patch, are you?"
He started to speak, but changed his mind; while, without being noticed, she bent nearer, intently watching.
"Well?" she asked.
"I don't know," he said with a touch of uncertainty, "I reckon maybe it's all wrong up at Sunlight Patch, too!"
Tremendously moved, startled, fearful lest he drift entirely from her reach, she slipped still lower and looked up into his face.
"What does this mean?" she asked. "What has happened to you, boy?"