ctly
presented as she sat there on her rock. Mrs. Stringham was thus able to
say to herself, even after another interval of some length, that if her
young friend still continued absent it wouldn't be because--whatever
the opportunity--she had cut short the thread. She wouldn't have
committed suicide; she knew herself unmistakably reserved for some more
complicated passage; this was the very vision in which she had, with no
little awe, been discovered. The image that thus remained with the
elder lady kept the character of revelation. During the breathless
minutes of her watch she had seen her companion afresh; the latter's
type, aspect, marks, her history, her state, her beauty, her mystery,
all unconsciously betrayed themselves to the Alpine air, and all had
been gathered in again to feed Mrs. Stringham's flame. They are things
that will more distinctly appear for us, and they are meanwhile briefly
represented by the enthusiasm that was stronger on our friend's part
than any doubt. It was a consciousness she was scarce yet used to
carrying, but she had as beneath her feet a mine of something precious.
She seemed to herself to stand near the mouth, not yet quite cleared.
The mine but needed working and would certainly yield a treasure. She
was not thinking, either, of Milly's gold.

VI

The girl said nothing, when they met, about the words scrawled on the
Tauchnitz, and Mrs. Stringham then noticed that she had not the book
with her. She had left it lying and probably would never remember it at
all. Her comrade's decision was therefore quickly made not to speak of
having followed her; and within five minutes of her return, wonderfully
enough, the preoccupation denoted by her forgetfulness further declared
itself. "Should you think me quite abominable if I were to say that
after all----?"

Mrs. Stringham had already thought, with the first sound of the
question, everything she was capable of thinking, and had immediately
made such a sign that Milly's words gave place to visible relief at her
assent. "You don't care for our stop here--you'd rather go straight on?
We'll start then with the peep of to-morrow's dawn--or as early as you
like; it's only rather late now to take the road again." And she smiled
to show how she meant it for a joke that an instant onward rush was
what the girl would have wished. "I bullied you into stopping," she
added; "so it serves me right."

Milly made in general the most of her good frien