Then he remembered the blankets!  Last night he had had all of them, Gloria’s as well as his own.  He had wanted to make her take her covers and she had put him off, and he had gone to sleep, forgetting!  He stirred again, hastily, his hands groping, even his feet moving.  He had them yet, his and hers.  And she had slept through the cold night with no covering while he, never waking until now, had lain warm and comfortable.  He struggled to turn on his side and got himself raised a little despite the pain from the exertion, seeking her.  She must be frozen——­

Gloria was not in the cave.  He sank back, sure of that.  For she should be sleeping close by the fire.  Then she had gone down again for wood.  He frowned and lay staring upward again.  Gloria bringing wood while he lay here like a confounded log.  He grew nervously restive at the thought; it was unthinkable that she should do work like that.  He saw her in his mind, struggling with the unaccustomed labour.  And always he saw her as he had first seen her, a fragile-looking girl, a girl with sweet little hands as soft as rose petals.  He remembered her as he had seen her that first day, a vision of loveliness in her fluffy pink dress, her skin like the skin of a baby, her eyes the soft, tender grey eyes of the girl to whom he had given his heart without reservation.  The glorious Gloria, all slender delicacy, like a little mountain flower, the Gloria for whom it had been his duty and his high privilege to labour.  He must fight to get his strength back, to get on his feet again, to save her from such toil as was no woman’s work in the world, certainly never the work for a girl like Gloria.

He heard a sound at the cave’s mouth.  Gloria was coming back.  He found no words with which to greet her, but lay very still, waiting for her to come in.  An emotion of which he was ashamed and yet which was infinitely sweet swept over him:  it was so wonderful a thing to have Gloria come to him, nurse him, put her hand so tenderly on his.  A thrill shot down his faintly stirring pulses as already he fancied her stealing softly to his side.  So he waited and, when she came where he could at last see her, watched.

She set her gun down; at first he wondered at that.  Poor little Gloria, he thought; taking her rifle with her when she went down for wood, frightened and yet strong-hearted enough to go in spite of fear.  She came on, not to him but to the smouldering coals.  She had turned toward him, but, no doubt, thought him still asleep.  He watched her, still knowing that presently she would come, awaiting her coming.  And again he was perplexed; he did not understand why Gloria walked like that.  He had never seen her walk so before; she had always been so light of foot, so graceful—­so like a fairy creature, scarcely touching the ground.  Now her feet dragged; she groped uncertainly; she was like one gone suddenly dizzy.