"You dear, silly boy, you don't want my hair in your face."
"Yes, I do."
"Why?"
"Because I love you, from the crown of your head to your dimpled foot, with all the strength of my soul."
There was a long silence, then the girl sighed contentedly. "I never thought love was anything like this, did you?"
"No, dear—I didn't know what it was."
"I didn't, either, but, of course, I wondered. From all I had heard and read I was afraid of it, and I thought it would make me unhappy, but it doesn't. I can't tell you how it makes me feel. It seems as if God made us for each other in the beginning, but kept us apart, and even after we met it wasn't much better until all at once there was a light, and then we knew. It seems as if I never could be miserable or out of sorts again; as if everything was right and always would be; that whatever came to me you'd help me bear it, and always you'd be my shield."
"Sweetheart," he answered, deeply touched, "I trust I may be. It would be my greatest happiness to bear your pain for you."
Far in the east there was a faint colour upon the clouds. "See," she said, "it is day." He drew her closer, and she went on,—"Think what it means to go away forever from all this horror—to go back to the hills!"
Robert swallowed hard, then said thickly, "Heart of Mine, I would die to shield you, but Destiny calls us here."