If Paul Abbey had chanced to ask her to marry him during a period of such bodily and spiritual rebellion, she would probably have committed herself to that means of escape in sheer desperation.  For she did not harden to the work; it steadily sapped both her strength and patience.  But he chose an ill time for his declaration.  Stella had overtaken her work and snared a fleeting hour of idleness in mid-afternoon of a hot day in early August.  Under a branchy alder at the cook-house-end she piled all the pillows she could commandeer in their quarters and curled herself upon them at grateful ease.  Like a tired animal, she gave herself up to the pleasure of physical relaxation, staring at a perfect turquoise sky through the whispering leaves above.  She was not even thinking.  She was too tired to think, and for the time being too much at peace to permit thought that would, in the very nature of things, be disturbing.

Abbey maintained for his own pleasure a fast motorboat.  He slid now into the bay unheard, tied up beside the float, walked to the kitchen, glanced in, then around the corner, and smilingly took a seat on the grass near her.

“It’s too perfect a day to loaf in the shade,” he observed, after a brief exchange of commonplaces.  “Won’t you come out for a little spin on the lake?  A ride in the Wolf will put some color in your cheeks.”

“If I had time,” she said, “I would.  But loggers must eat though the heavens fall.  In about twenty minutes I’ll have to start supper.  I’ll have color enough, goodness knows once I get over that stove.”

Abbey picked nervously at a blade of grass for a minute.

“This is a regular dog’s life for you,” he broke out suddenly.

“Oh, hardly that,” she protested.  “It’s a little hard on me because I haven’t been used to it, that’s all.”

“It’s Chinaman’s work,” he said hotly.  “Charlie oughtn’t to let you stew in that kitchen.”

Stella said nothing; she was not moved to the defence of her brother.  She was loyal enough to her blood, but not so intensely loyal that she could defend him against criticism that struck a responsive chord in her own mind.  She was beginning to see that, being useful, Charlie was making use of her.  His horizon had narrowed to logs that might be transmuted into money.  Enslaved himself by his engrossing purposes, he thought nothing of enslaving others to serve his end.  She had come to a definite conclusion about that, and she meant to collect her wages when he sold his logs, collect also the ninety dollars of her money he had coolly appropriated, and try a different outlet.  If one must work, one might at least seek work a little to one’s taste.  She therefore dismissed Abbey’s comment carelessly: 

“Some one has to do it.”

A faint flush crept slowly up into his round, boyish face.  He looked at her with disconcerting steadiness.  Perhaps something in his expression gave her the key to his thought, or it may have been that peculiar psychical receptiveness which in a woman we are pleased to call intuition; but at any rate Stella divined what was coming and would have forestalled it by rising.  He prevented that move by catching her hands.