It was nothing, it meant nothing; yet on her it should be binding,
though not on him. Yes, all her life she would remain as true to him in
mind and act as though she had indeed become his wife on that night of
fear. To do so would be her only happiness, she thought, though it is
strange that in her sorrow she should turn for comfort to this very
event, the mere mention of which had moved her to scorn and bitterness.
But so it was, and so let it be.

Leonard saw the look upon her face; he had never seen anything quite
like it before. With astonishment he heard her gentle words, and
something of the meaning of the look and words came home to him; at any
rate he understood that she was suffering. She was changed in his sight,
he no longer felt bitter towards her. He loved her; might it not be that
she also loved him, and that here was the key to her strange conduct?
Once and for all he would settle the matter; he would tell her that Jane
Beach had ceased to be more than a tender memory to him, and that she
had become all.

"Juanna," he said, addressing her by her Christian name for the first
time.

But there, as it was fated, the sentence began and ended, for at that
moment a canoe shot alongside of them, and Francisco's voice was heard
hailing them through the fog.

"Peter says that you have passed the camping place, senora. He did not
stop you because he thought that you knew it well."

"It was the mist, Father," Juanna answered with a little laugh. "We have
lost ourselves in a mist."

A few minutes and they were on the bank, and Leonard's declaration
remained unspoken. Nor did he make any attempt to renew it. It seemed to
him that Juanna had built a wall between them which he could not climb.
From that evening forward her whole attitude towards him changed. She no
longer angered him by bitter words; indeed, she was gentleness itself,
and nothing could be kindlier or more friendly and open than her manner,
but there it began and ended. Once or twice, indeed, he attempted some
small advance, with the result that instantly she seemed to freeze--to
become cold and hard as marble. He could not understand her, he feared
her somewhat, and his pride took alarm. At the least he could keep his
feelings to himself, he need not expose them to be trampled upon by this
incomprehensible girl.

So, although they were destined to live side by side for months, rarely
out of each other's sight or thoughts, he went his way and she