tter play at being very
matter-of-fact friends for the rest of the trip."

"No, thank you, Miss Sutherland--Frances, I mean," said I. "I'm not the
fool to pretend that----"

"Then pretend anything you like," and there was a sudden coldness in her
voice, which showed me she regarded my refusal and the slip in her name
as a rebuff. "Pretend anything you like, only don't say things."

That was a throwing down of armor which I had not expected.

"Then pretend that a pilgrim was lost in the dark, lost where men's
souls slip down steep places to hell, and that one as radiant as an
angel from heaven shone through the blackness and guided him back to
safe ground," I cried, taking quick advantage of my fair antagonist's
sudden abandon and casting aside all banter.

"Children! children!" cried the priest. "Children! Sun's down! Time to
go to your trundles, my babes!"

"Yes, yes," I shouted. "Wait till I hear the rest of this story."

At my words she had started up with a little gasp of fright. A look of
awe came into her gray eyes, which I have seen on the faces of those who
find themselves for the first time beside the abyss of a precipice. And
I have climbed many lofty peaks, but never one without passing these
places with the fearful possibilities of destruction. Always the novice
has looked with the same unspeakable fear into the yawning depths, with
the same unspeakable yearning towards the jewel-crowned heights beyond.
This, or something of this, was in the startled attitude of the
trembling figure, whose eyes met mine without flinching or favor.

"Or pretend that a traveler had lost his compass, and though he was
without merit, God gave him a star."

"Is it a pretty story, Rufus?" called the priest.

"Very," I cried out impatiently. "Don't interrupt."

"Or pretend that a poor fool with no merit but his love of purity and
truth and honor lost his way to paradise, and God gave him an angel for
a guide."

"Is it a long story, Rufus?" called the priest.

"It's to be continued," I shouted, leaping to my feet and approaching
her.

"And pretend that the pilgrim and the traveler and the fool, asked no
other privilege but to give each his heart's love, his life's devotion
to her who had come between him and the darkness----"

"Rufus!" roared the priest. "I declare I'll take a stick to you. Come
away! D' y' hear? She's tired."

"Good-night," she answered, in a broken whisper, so cold it stabbed me
like steel; and