"We're somewhere in the middle of December," she said, "somewhere between the twelfth and the fourteenth,—yes! I'm as out as that!—and I've handled the stores pretty freely. So did that little beast until I got him." She nodded at the skin in his hand. "I don't see myself shooting much now, and so far I've not been able to break the ice to fish. It's too much for me. Even if it isn't too late to fish. This book we've got describes barks and mosses, and that will help, but if we stick here until the birds and things come, we're going to be precious short. We may have to last right into July. I've plans—but it may come to that. We ought to ration all the regular stuff, and trust to luck for a feast. The rations!—I don't know what they'll come to."
"Right O," said Trafford admiring her capable gravity. "Let's ration."
"Marjorie," he asked abruptly, "are you sorry we came?"
Her answer came unhesitatingly. "No!"
"Nor I."
He paused. "I've found you out," he said. "Dear dirty living thing!... You are dirty, you know."
"I've found myself," she answered, thinking. "I feel as if I've never loved you until this hut. I suppose I have in my way——"
"Lugano," he suggested. "Don't let's forget good things, Marjorie. Oh! And endless times!"
"Oh, of course! As for that——! But now—now you're in my bones. We were just two shallow, pretty, young things—loving. It was sweet, dear—sweet as youth—but not this. Unkempt and weary—then one understands love. I suppose I am dirty. Think of it! I've lugged you through the snow till my shoulders chafed and bled. I cried with pain, and kept on lugging——Oh, my dear! my dear!" He kissed her hair. "I've held you in my arms to keep you from freezing. (I'd have frozen myself first.) We've got to starve together perhaps before the end.... Dear, if I could make you, you should eat me.... I'm—I'm beginning to understand. I've had a light. I've begun to understand. I've begun to see what life has been for you, and how I've wasted—wasted."
"We've wasted!"