With his returning strength there crept into his mind the dawning of a hope that he might get well.  At first he denied it, denied even the conviction that he wished to live.  But not long.  The hope grew, and soon he found himself deliberately trying to build up his health.  Every day he put a greater test upon himself, and as summer drew on he felt his strength gradually increasing.  Against Doctor Bronson’s advice, he got an axe and set to work on the wood pile, very cautiously at first.

Every day he wielded the axe until from sheer exhaustion he could not lift it.  Then he would sit on a log and pant and scorn his weakness.  What a poor man it was who could not chop wood for ten minutes without getting out of breath!  This pile of logs became to him a serious and meaning obstacle.  Every morning he went at it doggedly.  His back grew lame, his arms sore, his hands raw and blistered.  But he did not give up.

Mel seemed happy to see him so occupied, and was loath to call him even when it was necessary.  After lunch it was his habit to walk in the woods.  Unmindful of weather, every day he climbed the hill, plunged into the woods, and tramped until late in the afternoon.  Returning, he usually slept until Mel called him to dinner.  Afterward they spent the evening in the little library.  The past seemed buried.  Lane’s curiosity as to family and friends had not reawakened.

Mel possessed a rich contralto voice which had been carefully cultivated.  Every evening in the twilight, with only the flickering of the wood fire in the room, she would sit at the piano and sing.  Lane would close his eyes and let the mellow voice charm his every sense.  It called up his highest feelings; it lingered in his soul, thrilled along his heart and played on the chords of love and hope.  It dispelled the heavy gloom that so often pressed down upon him; it vanquished the depression that was the forerunner of his old terrible black mood.

It came about that Lane spent most of his time outdoors, in the fields, along the river, on the wooded hills.  The morbid brooding lost its hold on his mind, and in its place came memories, dreams, imaginations.  He walked those hills with phantoms of the past and phantoms of his fancy.

The birds sang, the leaves fluttered, the wind rustled through the branches.  White clouds sailed across the blue sky, a crow cawed from a hilltop, a hawk screeched from above, the roar of the river rapids came faintly upward.  And Lane saw eyes gazing dreamily downward, thoughtful at a word, looking into life, trying to pierce the veil.  It was all so beautiful—­so terrible.

The peeping of frogs roused in Lane sensations thrilling and strange.  The quick sharp notes were suggestive of cool nights, of flooded streams and marshy places.  How often Lane wandered in the dusk along the shore to listen to this chorus!

At that hour twilight stole down; the dark hills rose to the pale blue sky; there was a fair star and a wisp of purple cloud; and the shadowy waters gleamed.  Breaking into the trill of the frogs came the song of a lonely whippoorwill.