good only to befuddle woolly heads with;
as if, in other words, he had not been getting drunk like a
gentleman.... Anyhow, Arnold came back with a bad headache. She had
found a gentle brutality to fit his case. He would have been wise, I
believe, to bring her away, even if he had had to chloroform her to do
it. But Withrow couldn't have been wise in that way. Except for his
incurable weakness for Nature, he was the most delicate soul alive.

He didn't talk much to me about it, beyond telling me that she had
refused him. I made out the rest from his incoherences. He had not slept
in the barn, for they could hardly have let a cat sleep in the barn on
such cold nights; but Melora Meigs had apparently treated him even worse
than she had treated me. Kathleen Somers had named some of the unnamed
mountains after the minor prophets; as grimly as if she had been one of
the people they cursed. I thought that a good sign, but Withrow said he
wished she hadn't: she ground the names out so between her teeth. Some
of her state of mind came out through her talk--not much. It was from
one or two casually seen letters that I became aware of her desire to go
a little--just a little--mad.

In the spring Kathleen Somers had a relapse. It was no wonder. In spite
of the Franklin stoves, her frail body must have been chilled to the
bone for many months. Relief settled on several faces, when we heard--I
am afraid it may have settled on mine. She had been more dead than
alive, I judged, for a year; and yet she had not been able to cure her
sanity. That was chronic. Death would have been the kindest friend that
could arrive to her across those detested hills. We--the "we" is a
little vague, but several of us scurried about--sent up a trained nurse,
delaying somewhat for the sake of getting the woman who had been there
before; for she had the advantage of having experienced Melora Meigs
without resultant bloodshed. She was a nice woman, and sent faithful
bulletins; but the bulletins were bad. Miss Somers seemed to have so
little resistance: there was no interest there, she said, no willingness
to fight. "The will was slack." Ah, she little knew Kathleen Somers's
will! None of us knew, for that matter.

The spring came late that year, and in those northern hills there were
weeks of melting snow and raw, deep slush--the ugliest season we have to
face south of the Arctic circle. The nurse did not want any of her
friends to come; she wrote privatel