“Please, little Mother, let me remain a little while. I shall not be afraid. Why! I have been here several times alone before! All I have thought of is the stars! There are so many things I must think of before I could go to sleep. That’s a dear—let me stay,” she concluded in such an entreaty that Mrs. West allowed herself to be gently turned toward the house.
Bess stood watching till the retreating figure became fainter and fainter and was swallowed in the gloom of the willows near the spring.
She was alone—alone with the stars, the sea—the moon. Alone with all the new and strange emotions which she had learned this day! “Hurry, oh, moon! Come over the tops, to help me to think! To give me light! To teach me to know and to understand!” she prayed.
The sky grew brighter, the rough and rugged tips of the mountains softened and glowed with luminous silvery light, and the tiny ripples on the lake caught the half-shed radiance, glistening like millions of jewels. The girl drew her wrap snugly about her and sinking into a seat on a rock with her back against the huge log, drew her knees up so that her chin rested against them on her clasped hands. Her ears rang with the words they had heard in the morning—“I love you—you made me love you!” till she knew no other thought.
“Yes, but how can anyone know—know, when they really love! How is one to be sure—sure—sure!” The girl’s thoughts thronged. “All love seems to me the same! The degree may vary, but it all feels the same! How am I to know when I possess that other kind! Dear me, what’s the use of trying to love any more when my heart is too crowded already! No—I guess I won’t try—won’t even try to love you, Mr. Davis.” She straightened with a relieved sigh.
Just then, the moon, fair, round and full, shot up over the crests, and all the world was filled with beautiful, silvery light. One could distinguish the greens of the pines and firs as well as the browns and greys of the rocks. Even the girl’s dress showed a softest pink in the tender moonlight. How glorious it was! The lake looked like the sea as it stretched across the miles to the far shore. The mountains towered loftily into the vault of heaven. The quietude of the forests, as the gigantic monarchs bathed in the glowing light. And above all, to be, to breathe, to live amongst all this sublimity of beauty. How glorious it all is! What more could one wish? What more could one love? What need of any other kind of love? On—on ran the thoughts of the girl, all unconscious physically, save to the wonder of the night.
A movement behind her, caused her to turn her head quickly. She smothered a cry of fear as she saw approaching through the trees, a tall form closely wrapped in a brightly-colored blanket. How clearly she could distinguish the colors as the man came from the shadows out into the brilliant moonlight. Bess held her breath and did not move as the man stopped and looked searchingly about. Silently he stood; then suddenly flinging out his arms and lifting his face to the witchery of the moon, the blanket fell off his shoulders to the ground about him and revealed Henry West.
What a picture he made! His upturned face, silhouetted against the trees, seemed in a halo of light—the arms lifted in an appeal to the sky. The garb of the white man enshrouded him, the robe of the Indian lay at his feet. Slowly he passed his hands across his brow with a despairing gesture, and held them over his eyes, as if they could no longer endure the lovely, if loveless, night.
When the object of her alarm had vanished, Bess startled West by springing quickly to the top of the log and saying: “Oh, Henry! How you frightened me! When I saw you stalking through the trees I thought it was an In—!” Quickly as she checked herself, she was not quick enough, for West ended her sentence for her.