Neale found her sunk in the old, hopeless, staring, brooding mood.  He tried patience at first, and gentleness, but without avail.  She would not come with him.  The meal was eaten without her.  Later Neale almost compelled her to take a little food.  He felt discouraged again.  Time had flown all too swiftly, and there was Larry coming with the horses and sunset not far off.  It might be weeks, even months, before he would see her again.

“Allie, are you ever going to cheer up?” he demanded.

“No—­no,” she sighed.

He put his hand under her chin, and, forcing her face up, studied it earnestly.  Strained, white, bloodless, thin, with drooping lips and tragic eyes, it was not a beautiful, not even a pretty face.  But it might have been one—­very easily.  The veiled, mournful eyes did not evade his; indeed, they appeared to stare deeply, hopelessly, yearningly.  If he could only say and do the right thing to kill that melancholia.  She needed to be made to live.  Suddenly he had the impulse to kiss her.  That, no doubt, was owing to the proximity of her lips.  But he must not kiss her.  She might care for him some day —­it was natural to imagine she would.  But she did not care now, and that made kisses impossible.

“You just won’t cheer up?” he went on.

“No—­no.”

“But you were so different out there by the brook.”

She made no reply.  The veil grew darker, more shadowy, over her eyes.  Neale divined a deadness in her.

“I’m going away,” he said, sharply.

“Yes.”

“Do you care?” He went on, with greater intensity.

She only stared at him.

“You must care!” he exclaimed.

“Why?” she asked, dully,

“Why! ...  Because—­because—­” he stammered, angry with himself.  After all, why should she care?

“I wish—­you’d—­left me—­to die!” she moaned.

“Oh!  Allie!  Allie!” began Neale, in distress.  Then he caught the different quality in her voice.  It carried feeling.  She was thinking again.  He swore that he would overcome this malady of hers, and he grew keen, subtle, on fire with his resolve.  He watched her.  He put his hands on her shoulders and pulled her gently.  She slid off the pile of buffalo robes to her knees before him.  Then she showed the only hint of shyness he had ever noted in her.  Perhaps it was fear.  At any rate, she half averted her face, so that her loosened hair hid it.

“Allie!  Allie!  Listen!  Have you nothing to live for?” he asked.

“No.”

“Why, yes, you have.”

“What?”

“Why, I—­The thing is—­Allie—­you have me!” he said, a little hoarsely.  Then he laughed.  How strange his laugh sounded!  He would always remember that rude room of logs and furs and the kneeling girl in the dim light.

“You!”

“Yes, me,” he replied, with a ring in his voice.  Never before had she put wonder in a word.  He had struck the right chord at last.  Now it seemed that he held a live creature under his hands, as if the deadness and the dread apathy had gone away forever with the utterance of that one syllable.  This was a big moment.  If only he could make up to her for what she had lost!  He felt his throat swell, and speech was difficult.