lonely. Her heart
sank at the every complaint of the wind, and she dreaded the fall of the
shadows. Three times she thrilled with inexpressible joy at a sound on
the threshold, but always it was just the wind, mocking her distress.

She saw the sinister, northern night growing between the spruce trees,
and she dreaded it as never before. She cooked a meager supper--the
supplies were almost gone--but she had no heart to sit up and talk
with Harold. At last she went behind her curtain, hoping to forget her
fears in sleep.

All through the hours of early night she slept only at intervals:
dozing, coming to herself in starts and jerks, and dreaming miserably.
The hours passed, and still Bill did not return.

Her imagination was only too vivid. In her thoughts she could see this
stalwart woodsman of hers camping somewhere in the snowdrifts,
blanketless, staying awake through the bitter night to mend the fire,
and perhaps in trouble. She knew something of the northern cold that
was assailing him, hovering, waiting for the single instant when his
fire should go down or when he should drop off to sleep. Oh, it was
patient, remorseless. He was likely hungry, too, and despairing.

She wakened before dawn; and the icy, winter stars were peering through
the cabin window. Surely Bill had returned by now: yet it would hardly
be like him to come in and not let her know of his safe return. He had
always seemed so well to understand her fears, he was always so
thoughtful. There was no use trying to go back to sleep until she knew
for certain. She slipped from her bed onto the floor of the icy cabin.

She missed the cozy warmth of the fire; but, shivering, she slipped
quickly into her clothes. Then she lighted a candle and put on her
snowshoes. She mushed across the little space of snow to the men's
cabin.

The east was just beginning to pale: the stars seemed lucid as ever in
the sky. There was a labyrinth of them, uncounted millions that gleamed
and twinkled in every little rift between the spruce trees. Even the
stars of lesser magnitude that through the smoke of her native city had
never revealed themselves were out in full array to-night. And the icy
air stabbed like knives the instant she left the cabin door. It was the
coldest hour she had ever known.

She knocked on Harold's door, then waited for a reply. But the cabin
was ominously silent. Her fears increased: she knew that if Bill were
present he wo