upon them
so that she could do so. Slowly they came up and stole about my neck,
and then she drew my lips down to hers once more and held them there
for a long time. At last she spoke.

"Why didn't you do this at first, David? I have been waiting so long."

"What!" I cried. "You said that you hated me!"

"Did you expect me to run into your arms, and say that I loved you
before I knew that you loved me?" she asked.

"But I have told you right along that I love you," I said. "Love
speaks in acts," she replied. "You could have made your mouth say what
you wished it to say, but just now when you came and took me in your
arms your heart spoke to mine in the language that a woman's heart
understands. What a silly man you are, David?"

"Then you haven't hated me at all, Dian?" I asked.

"I have loved you always," she whispered, "from the first moment that I
saw you, although I did not know it until that time you struck down
Hooja the Sly One, and then spurned me."

"But I didn't spurn you, dear," I cried. "I didn't know your ways--I
doubt if I do now. It seems incredible that you could have reviled me
so, and yet have cared for me all the time."

"You might have known," she said, "when I did not run away from you
that it was not hate which chained me to you. While you were battling
with Jubal, I could have run to the edge of the forest, and when I
learned the outcome of the combat it would have been a simple thing to
have eluded you and returned to my own people."

"But Jubal's brothers--and cousins--" I reminded her, "how about them?"

She smiled, and hid her face on my shoulder.

"I had to tell you SOMETHING, David," she whispered. "I must needs
have SOME excuse for remaining near you."

"You little sinner!" I exclaimed. "And you have caused me all this
anguish for nothing!"

"I have suffered even more," she answered simply, "for I thought that
you did not love me, and I was helpless. I couldn't come to you and
demand that my love be returned, as you have just come to me. Just now
when you went away hope went with you. I was wretched, terrified,
miserable, and my heart was breaking. I wept, and I have not done that
before since my mother died," and now I saw that there was the moisture
of tears about her eyes. It was near to making me cry myself when I
thought of all that poor child had been through. Motherless and
unprotected; hunted across a savage, primeval world by that hideous
brute of