Leo watched him disappear in the gloom of the woods. Then he turned back impatiently to the fire. He hunched himself up, resting his chin upon his hands, and his elbows on his knees. The mention of their losses had again driven him hard, but, curiously enough, now the eyes of the watching woman saw that his mood had changed for the better. His were less straining, and the veins of his temples no longer stood out like twisted cords. She began to hope. She felt, dangerous as it might seem, that it would be far better that he should talk, whatever pain such talk might cost her. Far better than that he should sit silently nursing his despair.
The idea became fixed in her mind, and she cast about for an opening. Her instinct belonged to her sex; she knew, none better, the burden of dreary thoughts hugged to a silent bosom. It was difficult. Leo was at all times aloof. His armor of reserve left her still a stranger to his inmost feelings and thoughts, so that she scarcely knew how to approach the task she contemplated.
She was spared her trouble, however. It was Leo who at last broke the silence and made possible that very purpose the contemplation of which filled her with so much doubt. He stirred, and swiftly aimed a vicious kick at a log protruding from the embers of the fire. The response was a shower of sparks flying upward. Then he turned to her and began talking rapidly.
"I—I sometimes feel as if I could blame you for all—this," he began, in a low, harsh tone. "But I don't. I've still got sense enough for that. And it's lucky—lucky for you."
The woman's face paled under the beaver cap pressed low down upon her head. The threat was the more terrible for the simplicity of the manner in which he uttered it.
"How could I be responsible?" she asked, while her heart chilled within her.
"How?" Leo laughed without mirth. "I tell you I don't blame you—and yet I might. I did not intend to make this journey in winter."
Audie understood. She knew he was making this journey for her sake. Therefore she remained silent. How could she deny the blame, which, she knew in her heart, he set at her door?
"Say, I wonder if you know what this means to us—to me," he went on, in a tone of suppressed passion. "No, you don't—you can't. Guess it's not likely. You just remember we've still enough food for the journey which is to bring us where your child can be born in—in decency. You know we have no money. But that don't mean a thing to you, because you guess there's a man's hand ready to get busy in your service. You've no thought for anything else, because—because I guess you're a woman."
He caught his breath sharply as though laboring under a stab of intense bodily pain.