The warm autumn sun fell upon them for a full hour, then it shifted and the chill of the approaching evening warned the reader of the flight of time. He stopped suddenly to find that his companion had long since forgotten her hunger and food. Across the débris she bent, absorbed and tense. Her hands were clasped close—cold, little hands they were—and her big eyes were strained and wonder-filled.
“Is that—all?” she asked, hoarsely.
“Why, no, child, there’s more.”
“Go on!”
“It’s too late! We must get back.”
“I—I must know the rest! Why, don’t you see, you know how it turns out; I don’t!”
“Shall I tell you?”
“No, no. I want it here with the warm sun and the pines and your—yourself making it real.”
“I do not understand, Nella-Rose!” But as he spoke Truedale began to understand and it gave him an uneasy moment. He knew what he ought to do, but knew that he was not going to do it! “We’ll have to come again and hear the rest,” was what he said.
“Yes? Why”—and here the shadowy eyes took on the woman-look, the look that warned and lured the man near her—“I did not know it ever came like that—really.”