“Don’t die,” she whispered. “Dear God, don’t let him die! Don’t let him die!”
He trembled slightly. His arms were free though benumbed. He slipped one around her. He attempted to speak, but could not articulate a single word. He managed nothing better than a faint sigh. She drew gently back from him, still crouched and kneeling and not quite out of the embrace of his numbed arm, and looked into his face. She looked into his eyes. There were tears on her cheeks—tears and melted snowflakes.
“Thank God!” she whispered; and then she moved back from him and stood up and turned away. She raised both hands to her face.
Vane moistened his dry lips.
“They bagged me,” he said. “But what’s their game? And where are we? And how did you get here?”
She came back to him and knelt again, smiling tremulously and dabbing at her eyes with wet fingers.
“I tried to overtake you,” she said. “I didn’t go home—only to the door—and then I turned back. I felt that—I had been—rude. And I was afraid. But I couldn’t catch up to you before—you were attacked. They were carrying you when I got near. I followed them all the way, and hid until they went away from here. I knew they wouldn’t kill you. I knew they would leave you to die—lost—helpless—starved. See these!”
She lifted his snowshoes from the floor for his inspection. The tough webbing was torn hopelessly from both frames.
