In the heavy stupor that follows the utmost exhaustion, Dennis slept hour after hour. The rest of the day was a perfect blank to him. But Christine, partially covering and shading his face with the edge of her shawl, bent over him as patient in watching as he had been brave in her deliverance. It was beautiful to see the features once so cold and haughty, now sweet with more than womanly tenderness. There upon that desolate beach, cold, hungry, homeless, shelterless, she was happier than she had been for months. But she trembled as she thought of the future; everything was so uncertain. She seemed involved in a labyrinth of dangers and difficulties from which she could see no escape. She knew that both store and home had gone, and probably most, if not all, of her father's fortune. She felt that these losses might greatly modify his plans, and really hoped that they would lead him to remain in this country. She felt almost sure that he would not go back to Germany a poor man, and to remain in America was to give her a chance of happiness, and happiness now meant life with him over whom she bent. For a long time she had felt that she could give up all the world for him, but now existence would scarcely be endurable without him. In proportion to the slowness with which her love had been kindled was its intensity--the steady, concentrated passion of a strong, resolute nature, for the first time fully aroused. All indecision passed from her mind, and she was ready to respond whenever he should speak; but woman's silence sealed her lips, and more than maiden delicacy masked her heart. While she bent over him with an expression that, had he opened his eyes, might have caused him to imagine for a moment that his sleep had been death, and he had wakened in heaven, yet he must needs awake to find that the look and manner of earth had returned. Her sensitive pride made her guarded even in expressing her gratitude, and she purposed to slip his head off upon her shawl whenever he showed signs of awakening, so that he might believe that the earth only had been his resting-place. But now in his unconsciousness, and unnoted by all around, indeed more completely isolated by the universal misery and apathy about her than she could have been in her own home, with a delicious sense of security, she bent her eyes upon him, and toyed daintily with the curling locks on his brow. Whatever the future might be, nothing should rob her of the strange, unexpected happiness of this opportunity to be near him, purchased at such cost.