Suddenly she seemed again to be beside him.  He seemed to see the dark, animated face, the slender, tall girl wrapped in her big, rough coat.  He seemed to hear her vibrating voice, with that new, tender note in it that he had noticed when she last spoke to him.

“I’ll go home ahead of you, Peter, and wait for you there!”

Tears suddenly flooded his eyes, and he put his hand over them, and pressed it there, standing still, while the wave of tender and poignant and exquisite memories broke over him.

“We’ll go on, Buck,” he whispered, looking up through the trees at a strip of dark sky spangled with cold stars.  “We’ll go on.  She’s—­ she’s waiting for us somewhere, old fellow!”

THE END