"Don't try to get across that hill till you put in five hundred shovellers, Mr. Glover."
"That would take a week. If he's alive we must get him within twenty-four hours. He may freeze to death to-night."
"Don't try to cross that hill with a plough, Mr. Glover. Mind my words. It's no use. I've bucked with you many a time—you know that."
"Yes."
"You're going to your death when you try that."
"There's the doctor now, Foley," Glover answered. "Let him look you over carefully. Come this way."
The voices receded. Listening to the talk, little of which she understood, a growing fear had come over Gertrude. Her eyes had pierced the gray light about her, and as she heard Glover walk away she rose hurriedly and stepped to the doorway to detain him. Glover had disappeared, but before her, stretched on the couch back of the table, lay McGraw. She knew him instantly, and so strangely did the gloom shroud his features that his steady eyes seemed looking straight at her. She divined that he had been brought back hurt. A chill passed over her, a horror. She hesitated a moment, and, fascinated, stepped closer; then she knew she was staring at the dead.
Terror-stricken and with sinking strength she made her way to the hotel and slipped up to the parlor. Throwing off her wraps she went to the window; Glover was coming up the street. There was only a moment in which to collect herself. She hastened to her bedroom, wet her forehead with cologne, and at her mirror her fingers ran tremblingly over the coils of her hair. She caught up a fresh handkerchief for her girdle, looked for an instant appealingly into her own eyes and closed them to think. Glover rapped.
She met him with a smile that she knew would stagger his fond eyes. She drugged his ear with a low-voiced greeting. "You are late, dearest."
He looked at her and caught her hands. As his head bent she let her lips lie in his kiss, and let his arm find her waist as he kissed her deeply again. They walked together toward the fireplace, and when she saw the sadness of his face fear in her heart gave way to pity. "What is it?" she whispered. "Tell me."