In the distance they could hear the thunder of a falling tree.
"Even the great trees have to bow before him," said the young man.
A moment of silence followed.
"Let me be your friend," he pleaded.
She thought of what her grandmother had lately said to her and looked up at him sadly and thoughtfully.
"But you—you would make me love you," said she, "and when you were like the heart in my breast—so I could not live without you—then—then you would leave me."
"Ah, but you do not know," he answered. "I love you, and, even now, you are like the heart in my breast—I cannot live without you."
He approached her as he spoke and his voice trembled with emotion. She rose and ran a short distance up the trail and stopped.
"Will you not stay a little longer?" he pleaded.
She looked back at him with a curious interest and the least touch of fear in her eyes. She moved her head slowly, negatively, as if to tell him that she would love to stay but dared not.