It was like magic, and Jo rightly concluded that something in Donelle’s early life responded to these nights in the woods. She recalled the girl’s delirium, her references to weary wanderings. "It seems," Donelle once said, hugging her knees beside the glowing fire, "it seems as if I’d been here before." "One often feels that way," Jo replied as she prepared a fragrant meal, "and I’m not saying but what we do pass along the same way more than once. It may take more than one little life to learn all there is to know." And then Donelle talked of a book she had been reading and they grew very chummy. Once Jo suggested—it was when Donelle told her how she lived through the weeks, only because the week-ends were in view—that Nick should stay at the Walled House. "Nick, would you leave Mamsey?" Donelle held the dog’s face in her hands. It was an awful moment for Nick. He actually slunk. "I’d hate you if you would!" Donelle continued. "Now, sir, who is your choice?" Nick saved the day, he ambled over to Jo and licked her hand. "There!" exultingly cried Donelle; "that shows his blood." "It shows his common sense," laughed Jo. Once Tom Gavot shared their campfire for a night. He was waiting for them when they dismounted, his eyes shining. He wore a new, and whole, suit. "I am going away," he explained. This was no news to Jo, but it took Donelle by surprise. "I am going to Quebec," he went on. "Father Mantelle has a friend there who is to take me into his office. I’m going to learn about roads. You see, I always knew I’d get a chance!" He was very gay and full of hope. "And how does your father take it?" asked Jo, bending over the flames. The boy’s face darkened. "Father Mantelle talked to him," was all he said. But that evening Jo was wondrously kind. She gave permission to Tom to make his own pine-bough bed in the woods; she even seemed to be asleep when, by the fire, Donelle, holding her body close, her pale face shining in the glow, said to Tom: "I am never going to forget about roads, Tom Gavot. I always think of them as real things, I always have ever since you told me how to see them. I’m sure your roads are going to be very splendid ones." "They’ll be mighty lonely, just at first," Tom, stretched by the fire, smiled grimly. "Yes," Donelle nodded, "yes; they will. Why, Tom, I stand by the gates of the Walled House and look at the road and it is the loneliest feeling. I think of Mamsey at one end and something in me goes stretching out until it hurts. It goes stretching and pulling along the road until I can scarcely bear it." "That’s the way it will be with me, Donelle," then poor Tom’s face flushed a deep red. "You won’t mind, will you, if I tell you something?" "I’d love it." Donelle smiled happily.