atched--moving away from her.

They had their tea in silence then. She asked no questions, he
volunteered no information of his day. The heart was big within her, and
the terrible loneliness of age spread through her like a rising icy
mist. She watched him, filling all his wants. His hair was untidy and
his boots were caked with blackish mud. He moved with a restless,
swaying motion that somehow blanched her cheek and sent a miserable
shivering down her back. It reminded her of trees. His eyes were very
bright.

He brought in with him an odor of the earth and forest that seemed to
choke her and make it difficult to breathe; and--what she noticed with a
climax of almost uncontrollable alarm--upon his face beneath the
lamplight shone traces of a mild, faint glory that made her think of
moonlight falling upon a wood through speckled shadows. It was his
new-found happiness that shone there, a happiness uncaused by her and in
which she had no part.

In his coat was a spray of faded yellow beech leaves. "I brought this
from the Forest to you," he said, with all the air that belonged to his
little acts of devotion long ago. And she took the spray of leaves
mechanically with a smile and a murmured "thank you, dear," as though he
had unknowingly put into her hands the weapon for her own destruction
and she had accepted it.

And when the tea was over and he left the room, he did not go to his
study, or to change his clothes. She heard the front door softly shut
behind him as he again went out towards the Forest.

A moment later she was in her room upstairs, kneeling beside the
bed--the side she slept on--and praying wildly through a flood of tears
that God would save and keep him to her. Wind brushed the window panes
behind her while she knelt.

~VIII~

One sunny November morning, when the strain had reached a pitch that
made repression almost unmanageable, she came to an impulsive decision,
and obeyed it. Her husband had again gone out with luncheon for the day.
She took adventure in her hands and followed him. The power of
seeing-clear was strong upon her, forcing her up to some unnatural level
of understanding. To stay indoors and wait inactive for his return
seemed suddenly impossible. She meant to know what he knew, feel what he
felt, put herself in his place. She would dare the fascination of the
Forest--share it with him. It was greatly daring; but it would give her
greater understanding how to help and save h