She did go to sleep, but Prime did not go hunting until after the midday meal; and thus it happened that when Lucetta awoke, along in the afternoon, she found herself alone. For an hour or two she was content to lie quietly, waiting for Prime to return, but when the afternoon drew to a close and he still failed to put in an appearance she got up, rather totteringly, and replenished the camp-fire.
Another hour passed and she began to grow anxious. The spruce grove was plunged in shadows, but the sun had not yet set for the upper regions of the air. By the time it was fully dark she knew that Prime was lost, and in this new terror she was able to forget, in some measure at least, the effects of her late illness. Bestirring herself once more, she put more wood on the fire, hoping that it might blaze high enough to serve as a signal for the wanderer.
It was all she could do, and having done it she sat down to wait, her anxiety growing sharper as the evening wore on and there was neither sight nor sound to foreshadow the lost one's return.
XVIII
HEIGHTS AND DEPTHS
If she had not known it before, Lucetta was to learn now that sickness of any sort is but a poor preparation for a battle of anxiety and endurance. On the one other occasion when she had been thrown upon her own resources Prime had been at least visibly present, and his helplessness had given her strength to fight off the terrors. But now she was alone and the terrors pressed thickly.
What if something had happened to the rabbit-hunter? She knew his utter lack of gun dexterity, and her terrified imagination conjured up harrowing pictures of the missing one lying wounded and helpless in some distant forest solitude, a victim of his unselfish effort to provide not for his own needs but for hers. The thought was a keen torture, but she could not banish it, and as the hours lengthened it threatened to drive her mad. There was nothing she could do save to keep the fire burning brightly, and this she did, breaking the monotony of the unnerving suspense from time to time by collecting dry wood to heap upon the blaze.
It was nearly midnight before the agony came to a sudden end. She was lying on the blanket pallet, with her face hidden in the crook of an elbow when she looked up and saw Prime standing beside her. It was not in human nature to undergo the revulsion from the depths of despair calmly.