n grizzly. But the exploration of the winter lair had not been the
only thing Bill had in view. He also had certain words to say to
Virginia,--words that he could scarcely longer repress, and which he
couldn't have spoken with ease in Harold's presence. But now that they
were alone, the sentences wouldn't shape on his lips.

He mushed a while in silence. "I suppose I haven't got to tell you,
Virginia," he said at last. "That you--your own courage--saved my
life."

She looked up to him with lustrous eyes. The man thrilled to the last
little nerve. In her comradeship for him their luster was almost like
that of which he had dreamed so often. "I know it's true," she answered
frankly. "And I'm glad that--that it was mine, and not somebody
else's." She too seemed to be having difficulty in shaping her
thoughts. "I've never been happier about any other thing. To
pay--just a little bit of debt. But in paying it, I incurred another--so
the obligation is just as big as ever. You know--you saved my life,
too."

He nodded. This was no time for deception, for pretty lies.

"I saw you throw yourself in front of me," she went on. "I can
never forget it. I'll see that picture, over and over again, till I
die--how you plunged through the snow and got in front. So since we
each did for the other--the only thing we could do--there's nothing
more to be said about it. Isn't that so, Bill?"

The man agreed, but his lips trembled as they never did during the
charge of the grizzly.

"I've learned a lesson up here--that words aren't much good and don't
seem to get anywhere." The girl spoke softly. "Only deeds count.
After they're done, there is nothing much--that one can say."

So they did not speak of the matter again. They came to the bear's body
and back-tracked him through the snow. They pushed through the young
spruce from whose limbs the grizzly had knocked the snow. They they
came out upon the cavern mouth.

Instantly Bill understood how the fall of the tree had knocked away the
snow from the maw. "There's been a landslide here too, or a snowslide,"
he said. "You see--only the top of the cave mouth is left open. The
dirt's piled around the bottom."

He crawled up over the pile of rocks and dirt and, stooping, stepped
within the cavern. The girl was immediately behind him. Back five feet
from the opening the interior was dark as night: the cavern walls, gray
at the mouth, slowly paled and faded and