you, and their soft,
high voices cry, 'Hello! hello-o!'" Pierre nodded his head towards
the distance, and a musing smile divided his lips on his white teeth.
Presently he folded a cigarette, and went on:

"I had saved something to the last, as the great test, as the one thing
to open his eyes wide, if they could be opened at all. Alors, there was
no time to lose, for the wolf of Night was driving the red
glow-worm down behind the world, and I knew that when darkness came
altogether--darkness and night--there would be no help for him. Mon
Dieu! how one sleeps in the night of the north, in the beautiful wide
silence!... So, m'sieu', just when I thought it was the time, I called,
'Corinne! Corinne!' Then once again I said, 'P'tite Corinne! P'tite
Corinne! Come home! come home! P'tite Corinne!' I could see the fight
in the jail of sleep. But at last he killed his jailer; the doors in his
brain flew open, and his mind came out through his wide eyes. But he was
blind a little and dazed, though it was getting dark quick. I struck
his back hard, and spoke loud from a song that we used to sing on the
Chaudiere--Babiche and all of us, years ago. Mon Dieu! how I remember
those days--

"'Which is the way that the sun goes?
The way that my little one come.
Which is the good path over the hills?
The path that leads to my little one's home--
To my little one's home, m'sieu', m'sieu'!'

"That did it. 'Corinne, ma p'tite Corinne!' he said; but he did not look
at me--only stretch out his hands. I caught them, and shook them, and
shook him, and made him take a step forward; then I slap him on the
back again, and said loud: 'Come, come, Babiche, don't you know me?
See Babiche, the snow's no sleeping-bunk, and a polar bear's no good
friend.' 'Corinne!' he went on, soft and slow. 'Ma p'tite Corinne!'
He smiled to himself; and I said, 'Where've you been, Babiche? Lucky
I found you, or you'd have been sleeping till the Great Mass.' Then he
looked at me straight in the eyes, and something wild shot out of his.
His hand stretched over and caught me by the shoulder, perhaps to steady
himself, perhaps because he wanted to feel something human. Then he
looked round slow-all round the plain, as if to find something. At that
moment a little of the sun crept back, and looked up over the wall of
ice, making a glow of yellow and red for a moment; and never, north or
south, have I seen such beauty--so delicate,