And now, for the first time, Ben found himself regarding Beatrice.  He could scarcely take his eyes from her face.  He knew perfectly that he was staring rudely, but he was without the power to turn his eyes.  Her dark eyes fell under his gaze.

The truth was that Ben’s life had been singularly untouched by the influence of women.  Mostly his life had been spent in the unpeopled forest, away from women of all kinds; and such creatures as had admired him in Seattle’s underworld had never got close to him.  He had had many dreams; but some way it had never been credible to him that he should ever know womanhood as a source of comradeship and happiness.  Love and marriage had always seemed infinitely apart from his wild, adventurous life.

In his days in prison he had given up all dream of this happiness; but now he could begin to dream again.  Everything was changed now that he had come home.  The girl’s regard for him was friendly, even somewhat admiring, and the speculations of ripening womanhood were in her eyes.  He returned her gaze with frankest interest and admiration.  His senses had been made sharp in his wilderness life; and his respect for her grew apace.  She was not only innocent and girlish; she had those traits, innate, that a strong man loves in women:  such worth and depth of character as he wishes bequeathed to his children.

Ben drew a long breath.  It was good to be home.  He had not only found his forests, just as he had left them, but now again he was among the forest people.  This girl was of his own breed, not a stranger; her standards were his; she was a woods girl no less than he was a woodsman.  It is good to be among one’s own people, those who can follow through and understand.  She too knew the urge of unbridled vitality and spirit, common to all the woods children; and life’s vivid meaning was her inheritance, no less than his.  Her arms and lips were warm from fast-flowing blood, her nerves were vibrant and singing like his own.  A virgin still, her eyes were tender with the warmheartedness that is such a dominant trait of frontier peoples; but what fire, what passion might burn in them to-morrow!  They were dark, lovely eyes, rather somber now in their earnestness, seeming shadowed by the dark shadows of the spruce themselves.

No human face had ever given him such an image of beauty as that of this dark-eyed forest child before him.  Yet she was not piquant, demure, like the girls he had met in France; not stylish and sophisticated like those of the great cities he had visited since his return.  Her garb became her:  simple, not holding the eye in itself but calling attention to the brunette beauty of her throat and face, the warm redness of her childish mouth, and the brown, warm color of her arms.  She had dark, waving hair, lovely to touch, wistful red lips.  Because he was the woodsman, now and always, he marked with pleasure that there was no indication of ill-health or physical weakness about her.  Her body was lithe and strong, with the grace of the wild creatures.