"Yes, Douglas." He was silent. He was weak from loss of blood, but his thoughts were sharp, clear as never before. The years that were gone of his life seemed clogged into one bulk; how hungry they had been, hard, cruel! He never had felt it as now, while he lay helpless, his sultry look reading the woman's eyes bent on his. They were pure and restful; love and home waited in them; something beyond,--a peace he could not yet comprehend. But this life was not for him,--he remembered that; the girl was nothing to him now: he was not fool enough to taunt himself with false hopes. She came there out of pity: any woman would do as much for a wounded man. He would never fool himself to be so balked again. The loss cut too deep. So he forced his face to be cool and critical, while poor Dode waited, innocently wondering that he did not welcome her, pity her now that her father was dead, forgetting that he knew nothing of that. For him, he looked at the fire, wondering if the Rebel scouts could see it,--thinking it would not be many days before Lander would dislodge Jackson,--trying to think of anything rather than himself, and the beautiful woman kneeling there. Her eyes filled with tears at last, when he did not speak, and she turned away. The blood rushed to Palmer's face: surely that was more than pity! But he would not tempt her,--he would never vex her soul as he had done before: if she had come to him, as a sister might, because she thought he was dying, he would not taunt her with the old love she had for him. "I think I can stand up," he said, cheerfully; "lend me your arm, Theodora." Dode's arm was strong-nerved as well as fair; she helped him rise, and stood beside him as he went to the door, for he walked unsteadily. He took his hand from her shoulder instantly,--did not look at her: followed with his eye the black line of the fretted hills, the glimmer of the distant watch-fires. The path to the West lay through the Rebel camps. "It is a long trail out of danger," he said, smiling. "You are going? I thought you needed rest." Calm, icy enough now: he was indifferent to her. She knew how to keep the pain down until he was gone. "Rest? Yes. Where did you mean I should find it?"--facing her, sudden and keen. "Where am I to be sheltered? In your home, Theodora?" "I thought that. I see now that it was a foolish hope, Douglas." "How did you hope it? What brought you here?"--his voice thick, tremulous with passion. "Were you going to take me in as a Sister of Charity might some wounded dog? Are pity and gratitude all that is left between you and me?" She did not answer,--her face pale, unmoving in the moonlight, quietly turned to his. These mad heats did not touch her. "You may be cold enough to palter with fire that has burned you, Theodora. I am not." She did not speak.