“I do not —­ I shall never think in that way again, Mabel,” gasped forth the Pathfinder, who appeared to utter his words like one just raised above the pressure of some suffocating substance.  “No, no, I shall never think of you, or any one else, again in that way.”

“Pathfinder, dear Pathfinder, understand me; do not attach more meaning to my words than I do myself:  a match like that would be unwise, unnatural, perhaps.”

“Yes, unnat’ral —­ ag’in natur’; and so I told the Sergeant, but he would have it otherwise.”

“Pathfinder! oh, this is worse than I could have imagined!  Take my hand, excellent Pathfinder, and let me see that you do not hate me.  For God’s sake, smile upon me again.”

“Hate you, Mabel!  Smile upon you!  Ah’s me!”

“Nay, give me your hand; your hardy, true, and manly hand —­ both, both, Pathfinder! for I shall not be easy until I feel certain that we are friends again, and that all this has been a mistake.”

“Mabel!” said the guide, looking wistfully into the face of the generous and impetuous girl, as she held his two hard and sunburnt hands in her own pretty and delicate fingers, and laughing in his own silent and peculiar manner, while anguish gleamed over lineaments which seemed incapable of deception, even while agitated with emotions so conflicting, —­ “Mabel! the Sergeant was wrong.”

The pent-up feelings could endure no more, and the tears rolled down the cheeks of the scout like rain.  His fingers again worked convulsively at his throat; and his breast heaved, as if it possessed a tenant of which it would be rid, by any effort, however desperate.

“Pathfinder!  Pathfinder!” Mabel almost shrieked; “anything but this, anything but this!  Speak to me, Pathfinder!  Smile again, say one kind word, anything to prove you can forgive me.”

“The Sergeant was wrong!” exclaimed the guide, laughing amid his agony, in a way to terrify his companion by the unnatural mixture of anguish and light-heartedness.  “I knew it, I knew it, and said it; yes, the Sergeant was wrong after all.”

“We can be friends, though we cannot be man and wife,” continued Mabel, almost as much disturbed as her companion, scarcely knowing what she said; “we can always be friends, and always will.”

“I thought the Sergeant was mistaken,” resumed the Pathfinder, when a great effort had enabled him to command himself, “for I did not think my gifts were such as would please the fancy of a town-bred girl.  It would have been better, Mabel, had he not over-persuaded me into a different notion; and it might have been better, too, had you not been so pleasant and confiding like; yes, it would.”

“If I thought any error of mine had raised false expectations in you, Pathfinder, however unintentionally on my part, I should never forgive myself; for, believe me, I would rather endure pain in my own feelings than you should suffer.”