The Flaming Jewel

From his first-aid packet he took a capsule, dissolved it, sterilized the torn skin, then bandaged both feet with a deliciously cool salve, and drew the sheets into place.

Eve had not stirred nor spoken. He washed and dried his hands and came back, drawing his chair nearer to the bedside.

"Sleep, if you feel like it," he said pleasantly.

As she made no sound or movement he bent over to see if she had already fallen asleep. And noticed that her flushed cheeks were wet with tears.

"Are you suffering?" he asked gently.

"No. ... You are so wonderfully kind. ..."

"Why shouldn't I be kind?" he said, amused and touched by the girl's emotion.

"I tried to shoot you once. That is why you ought to hate me."

He began to laugh: "Is that what you're thinking about?"

"I -- never can -- forget----"

"Nonsense. We're quits anyway. Do you remember what I did to you?"

He was thinking of the handcuffs. Then, in her vivid blush he read what she was thinking. And he remembered his lips on her palms.

He, too, now was blushing brilliantly at the memory of that swift, sudden rush of romantic tenderness which this girl had witnessed that memorable day on Owl Marsh.

In the hot, uncomfortable silence, neither spoke. He seated himself after a while. And, after a while, she turned on her pillow part way toward him.

Somehow they both understood that it was friendship which had subtly filled the interval that separated them since that amazing day.

"I've often thought of you," he said, -- as though they had been discussing his absence.

No hour of the waking day that she had not thought of him. But she did not say so now. After a little while: "Is yours a lonely life?" she asked in a low voice.

"Sometimes. But I love the forest."

"Sometimes," she said, "the forest seems like a trap that I can't escape. Sometimes I hate it."

"Are you lonely, Eve?"

"As you are. You see I know what the outside world is. I miss it."

"You were in boarding school and college."

"Yes."

"It must be hard for you here at Star Pond."

The girl sighed, unconsciously: "There are days when I -- can scarcely -- stand it. ... The wilderness would be more endurable if dad and I were all alone. ... Bu even then----"

"You need young people of your own age, -- educated companions----"