"This is for his riches, but for our peril, Antoine."

"Who can say whither a woman's fancy goes? It is full of guessing. It is
clouds and darkness to-day, and sunshine--so much--to-morrow. I cannot
answer."

"I have a fear; if my husband loved me--"

"There is the mine," he interrupted firmly.

"When my heart aches so--"

"Angelique, there is the mine."

"Ah, my Antoine!"

And so these two stayed on the island of St. Jean, in Lake Superior,
through the purple haze of autumn, into the white brilliancy of winter,
guarding the Rose Tree Mine, which Falding the Englishman and his
companions had prospected and declared to be their Ophir.

But St. Jean was far from the ways of settlement, and there was little
food and only one hut, and many things must be done for the Rose Tree
Mine in the places where men sell their souls for money; and Antoine and
Angelique, French peasants from the parish of Ste. Irene in Quebec, were
left to guard the place of treasure, until, to the sound of the laughing
spring, there should come many men and much machinery, and the sinking
of shafts in the earth, and the making, of riches.

But when Antoine and Angelique were left alone in the waste, and God
began to draw the pale coverlet of frost slowly across land and water,
and to surround St. Jean with a stubborn moat of ice, the heart of the
woman felt some coming danger, and at last broke forth in words of
timid warning. When she once had spoken she said no more, but stayed
and builded the heaps of earth about the house, and filled every crevice
against the inhospitable Spirit of Winds, and drew her world closer
and closer within those two rooms where they should live through many
months.

The winter was harsh, but the hearts of the two were strong. They loved;
and Love is the parent of endurance, the begetter of courage. And every
day, because it seemed his duty, Antoine inspected the Rose Tree Mine;
and every day also, because it seemed her duty, Angelique said many
aves. And one prayer was much with her--for spring to come early that
the child should not suffer: the child which the good God was to give to
her and Antoine.

In the first hours of each evening Antoine smoked, and Angelique sang
the old songs which their ancestors learned in Normandy. One night
Antoine's face was lighted with a fine fire as he talked of happy days
in the parish of Ste. Irene; and with that romantic fervour of his race
which the stern winters of