Durgan left Alden to put the stranger through his paces, and went hastily round the ledge of the mine and swung himself up to the trail, meaning to intercept Bertha before she came near. He had not correctly estimated her pace, for when he emerged on the path she had just passed over it. He could only follow her, as the girl descended by a light jump to the rock platform.
She was about forty feet from the door of the hut when she stood still and, turning, spoke: "My sister has a terrible attack of neuralgia. If the carriage is going back—we must send for the doctor. Who—who is it?"
In the next few confused moments Durgan was promising to send the message, seeking words to persuade her to return, and giving some answer to her question; while Bertha was trying to hold the dogs still, and they, on the scent of strange footsteps, were straining on their leashes toward the door of the hut.
She was, perhaps, little loth to be pulled a few steps forward so that she could look in at the open door for herself. The lantern, which burned full in the face of the stranger, writing at the table, sent a long, bright stream outwards, in which Bertha now stood framed. In Durgan's memory afterwards this moment always remained with these two faces lit up at each end of the beam of light, while all around them was lost in darkness.
The stranger had thrown back his coat. His face was in clear profile.
Durgan himself was paralyzed by the intensity of emotion which leaped to Bertha's face. She gave an inarticulate sound of terrified joy, a moan of heart-rending joy—or was it terror?
The stranger, turning sharply, saw the girl, her face and figure illumined. His jaw dropped with terror. He stood up abjectly.
She sank to the ground, and Durgan, bending over her, heard her trying to gasp a word with a wonderful intonation of tenderness and astonishment. That word was "Father." She tried again and again to speak it aloud.
She seemed fainting. Instinctively Durgan held the dogs, who broke into a howl of rage against the abject intruder.