Towards midnight, to ease the melancholy smell of the dying lamp, he drew reluctantly forth from his deepest blanket-wrapper pocket the little knotted handkerchief that encased the still-treasured handful of fragrant fir-balsam, and bending groaningly forward in his chair sifted the brittle, pungent needles into the face of the one glowing ember that survived. Instantly in a single dazzling flash of flame the tangible forest symbol vanished in intangible fragrance. But along the hollow of his hand,--across the edge of his sleeve,--up from the ragged pile of books and papers,--out from the farthest, remotest corners of the room, lurked the unutterable, undestroyable sweetness of all forests since the world was made. Almost with a sob in his throat Stanton turned again to the box of letters on his table. By dawn the feverish, excited sleeplessness in his brain had driven him on and on to one last, supremely fantastic impulse. Writing to Cornelia he told her bluntly, frankly, "DEAR CORNELIA: "When I asked you to marry me, you made me promise very solemnly at the time that if I ever changed my mind regarding you I would surely tell you. And I laughed at you. Do you remember? But you were right, it seems, and I was wrong. For I believe that I have changed my mind. That is:--I don't know how to express it exactly, but it has been made very, very plain to me lately that I do not by any manner of means love you as little as you need to be loved. "In all sincerity, "CARL." To which surprising communication Cornelia answered immediately; but the 'immediately' involved a week's almost maddening interim, "DEAR CARL: "Neither mother nor I can make any sense whatsoever out of your note. By any possible chance was it meant to be a joke? You say you do not love me 'as little' as I need to be loved. You mean 'as much', don't you? Carl, what do you mean?" Laboriously, with the full prospect of yet another week's agonizing strain and suspense, Stanton wrote again to Cornelia. "DEAR CORNELIA: "No, I meant 'as little' as you need to be loved. I have no adequate explanation to make. I have no adequate apology to offer. I don't think anything. I don't hope anything. All I know is that I suddenly believe positively that our engagement is a mistake. Certainly I am neither giving you all that I am capable of giving you, nor yet receiving from you all that I am capable of receiving. Just this fact should decide the matter I think. "CARL." Cornelia did not wait to write an answer to this. She telegraphed instead. The message even in the telegraph operator's handwriting looked a little nervous. "Do you mean that you are tired of it?" she asked quite boldly. With miserable perplexity Stanton wired back. "No, I couldn't exactly say that I was tired of it."