“Speak for yourself!” sobbed the girl. “I’ve known it always, always, _always_! Ever since I was a child. Every minute since then. There’s just been _you_! Nothing else counted. And--and you never--” “Never cared?” he guessed. “Girl, I’ve cared so much it was the life of me. An’ because it was the life I lived n’ the breath I breathed, I didn’t even guess it. Never once. Oh it’s like I’d been trav’lin’ through heaven blin’folded. Why didn’t you _tell_ me? Why wasn’t it like this two years ago? Dey, if I’d known--if I’d understood I felt that way ’bout you, I’d a’--no, I wouldn’t, either. I’d a kep’ away for fear of breakin’ my heart. For it wouldn’t a’ seemed possible you could love me. _Say_ you love me, girl!” he ordered, fiercely. “Say it over an’ over--a lot of times!” “Love you?” murmured Desirée, her sobs dying away. “_Love_ you?--Why,--!” With a sudden passion of adoration she flung her arms again about his neck, straining him close to her. She could not speak. She could only press her soft, hot face close--ever so close--to his rough cheek; and cling fast to him as though she feared he might vanish, dreamlike, from her clasp. “When you went away,” he continued after a divine silence, “it was like the heart of me had been torn out. I didn’t know what ailed me. I thought it was a craze to work. An’ I worked till I set all Granite to totterin’. An’ all the time it was you,--_you_! Then when I saw you again, there at the station in the mist, it seemed like I’d come home. I wanted to catch hold of your dress an’ beg you never to get out of my sight again. An’ I was ashamed of feelin’ that way, an’ I was afraid you’d find out an’ laugh at me. I was wild in _love_ with you, girl,--an’ I never knew it. Did--did _you_ know I was?” “I always knew it,” she whispered. “I knew you loved me. That you cared almost as much as I cared. But you never even suspected. And,--oh, how could _I_ tell you?” Again they were silent for a space. Then she said, a little timidly: “God meant us for each other, dear love. I believe in such things. And so must you. And we have found each other at last. Here, alone, on the top of the world. Just as He meant us to. Oh, I must be good--so good--if I am to deserve all this.” “Deserve it?” he echoed in choked amaze. “Girl, you make me feel like hidin’ my head somewheres. What is there in all this for _you_? I’m a rough, uneddicated chap that most folks look down on, an’ the rest don’t look at, at all. I got nothin’ but my money an’--Oh, Dey, I got _you_! An’ I’m the happiest man that ever got lost in this measly, heavenly wilderness. It ain’t true. An’ presently I’ll wake up. But while it lasts--”