"Lenz, for Heaven's sake, Lenz, stand up!" cried Annele from the chamber. "Dear Lenz," she continued, as the two men hastened to her, "you had meant to take your own life. I know not whether you could really have done it; but that you thought of it, and meant to do it, was my fault. Oh, how your heart must have suffered! I cannot tell what sin of mine most needs your forgiveness." "It is over now," said Petrovitsch, soothingly. It was strange that Annele's mind should be working on the same subject they had been discussing in the next room. Their tone was so low that she could not possibly have heard them. Both men did their best to soothe her. "Is that noon or night?" asked Annele, as several clocks struck three. "It must be night." They rehearsed together all that had happened since the avalanche, and concluded it must be past midnight. "O Day! if I could once, but once again, behold the sun! rise and help me, Sun!" was Annele's constant cry. "I will live, I must live for long years yet. If a single day could but undo such great misery! but it will need years. I will persevere faithfully and patiently." There was no quieting her till presently she dropped asleep. Petrovitsch too slept, leaving to Lenz his solitary watch. He dared not sleep; he must face this threatening death, and avert it if he could. He extinguished the light to save their precious store of brandy, for they could not tell how long it might be needed. As he sat gazing into the darkness, one moment he thought it was day, the next that it must be night; now one was a comfort to him, now the other. If it was day, help was nearer; if night, the work of forcing a passage through the snow and gravel and fallen trees had been going on the longer. At times he seemed to hear a sound without; it was only seeming. There was no sound save the raven croaking in his sleep. CHAPTER XXXVII. A PHALANX.