Stephen felt his face grow hot. He said nothing for a long time. He could not think of anything to say. There was a strange feeling about his throat, and he tried to clear it. The mist kept getting in his eyes. He was glad when his sister began to tell of her aunt's illness and the long, weary months when she had been chained to the sickroom at the beck and call of a whimsical, wandering mind.
She did not say much about herself, but he felt touched by her sweet self-sacrifice and her loneliness. It reminded him of his own lonely boyhood, and his heart went out in sympathy. He decided that it was a nice thing, after all, to have a sister. It was like Stephen to forget all about the end of their journey and the poor accommodations he had to offer her, utterly unfit for a woman, much less fit for one who had been brought up in luxury. He grew gay as they went on, and talked more freely with her. When Philip suddenly appeared out of the silent darkness ahead of them, and said it was time to change guides, he was almost loath to leave his sister.
Margaret, too, would rather not have had the change; but she could scarcely ask her brother to walk the whole of the five miles. There was something about him that reminded her, even in the dark, of their father, and so he did not seem strange; but this other tall man, who had taken control of the entire expedition, frightened her a little. She wished she could get a glimpse of his face and know what kind of a man he was. It was hard to know what to say to him, and still more embarrassing to keep entirely still.
But the road was growing rougher. The new guide had to give a good deal of attention to the horse, and she to keeping her unsteady seat. The road was steadily rising before them now. She could feel that by the inclination of the saddle. It seemed to be stony also.
Once she slipped, and would have fallen from the saddle if Philip had not caught her. After that he placed his arm about her and steadied her. She could not object, for there was nothing intimate or personal in the touch.
She concluded that Philip was a gentleman, whatever else he might not be.
She gripped the saddle in front of her a little tighter, and looked into the darkness, wondering whether this journey would ever end. She essayed one or two sentences of conversation, but the young man beside her was distraught, and seemed to be more interested in looking ahead and guiding the horse.
The road was even steeper now. Margaret wondered whether they were going up the Rocky Mountains. It seemed as if they had come far enough to have almost reached them, according to her vague notion of the geography of that land.
"Wouldn't it be better if I were to get off and walk?" she asked timidly, after the horse had almost stumbled to his knees.
"No," answered Philip shortly; "we'll soon be over this. Put your arm around my neck and hold on now. Don't be afraid! Steady, there, steady, Jack!"
The horse scrambled, and seemed to Margaret to be walking on his hind legs up into the air. She gave a little scream, and threw her arm convulsively about her companion's neck. But she was held firmly, and seemed to riding upon Philip's shoulder with the horse struggling under her for a moment. Then like a miracle they reached upper ground, and she was sitting firmly on the horse's back, Philip walking composedly beside her, his arm no more about her.
It was lighter too, here; and all the mist seemed to have dropped away and to be melting at their feet.
"It's all over now," said Philip, and there was a joyous ring in his voice quite different from the silent, abstracted man who had walked beside her for so long. "I hope you weren't much frightened. I've been afraid how Jack would act there. That is an ugly place. It must be fixed before you come this way again. You see the bridge was broken down the way we usually go, and we had to come around another way. You were perfectly safe, you know; only it was bad to frighten you when you have just come, and you are tired, too. But we are almost there now. And look! Look ahead!"
Margaret looked, and saw before her a blaze of light flare up till it made a great half-circle on the edge of the horizon. Not until it rose still higher—like a human thing, she thought—did the girl recognize the moon.
"O, it is the moon!" she said awestruck. "Is it always so great out here?"
Philip watched her as she looked. He felt that for the first time in his life he had companionship in this great sight of which he never tired.
"It is always different," he said musingly, "and yet always the same," and he felt as he was saying it that she would understand. He had never talked to Stephen about the moon. Stephen did not care for such things except as they were for his personal convenience or pleasure. Moonlight might be interesting if one had a long ride to take, in Stephen's economics, but not for purposes of sentiment.
"I see," said Margaret. "Yes, I recognize my old friend now. It seems as if it wore a smile of welcome."
"Do you mean the man in the moon, or the lady? Which do you claim?"
"O, both!" laughed Margaret, turning toward him for the first time since there had been any light. And now she could see his fine profile outlined against the moon, the firm chin, the well-molded forehead and nose, and the curve of the expressive lips.
"Now, look down there, back where we have come!" said Philip, as she looked.
The mist was glorified like an expectant one waiting to be redeemed from the state where it was put till its work was done.
"O!" breathed the girl in wonder. "You can fairly see the darkness flee away!"
"So you can," said Philip, looking off. "I never noticed that before."
And they started forward round the turn in the road where Stephen was waiting impatiently for them to come up with him, and almost at once they saw before them the outlines of the rude building the two young men called home, lying bathed in the new-risen moonlight.
Chapter III.
Margaret Makes Herself at Home
The moonlight was doing its best to gild the place with something like beauty to welcome the stranger, but it was effective only out-of-doors, and the two young men were painfully conscious of the state in which they had left the inside of their house, as they helped their guest from the horse and prepared to take her in. All the impossibility of the situation suddenly came upon them both, and made them silent and embarrassed.
Stephen took on his sulky look, which ill became him, while he stumbled over the moonbeams that followed him when he opened the door, and lighted the wicked little oil lamp. He had no mind to welcome his sister there. What did he want of a sister anyway? His foot caused the crisp rattle of paper as he threw the match down, and he knew it was her letter lying on the floor. The same mood that had seized him when he read it was upon him again; and he turned, scowling, determined to show her that she had made a serious mistake in rushing out here unbidden.
Margaret Halstead turned from the brilliant moonlight to the blinking lamplight bravely, and faced the scene of her self-chosen mission.
There may have been something in the half-defiant attitude of her brother that turned her from her purpose of having a good long look at him and making sure of her welcome. She may have seen that she had yet to win her way into the citadel of his heart, and wisdom or intuition taught her to break the embarrassment of this first moment in the light by a commonplace remark.
Her eyes roved anxiously about the dreary room in search of something to bring cheer. They fell upon the old desk in the corner.
"O Stephen! There is the desk from your old room!" she cried eagerly, going over to it and touching it tenderly. "I used to go up into your room and sit by it to study my lessons. And sometimes I would put your picture on the top,—the one you sent father when you were in the military school,—and sit, and admire you, and think how nice it was to have a straight, strong brother dressed in a military suit."
Stephen turned toward her with a look of mingled astonishment and admiration. His