"I'll look out for Woolly Billy," answered Blackstock. "And I'll look out for the shop, whether _you_ care about it or not. It's yours, and your name's on the door, and anything of yours, anything you've touched, an' wherever you've put your little foot, that's something for me to care about. I ain't no hand at making pretty speeches, Mary, or paying compliments, but I tell you these here old sawdust roads are just wonderful to me now, because your little feet have walked on 'em. Ef only I could think that you could care--that I had anything, was anything, Mary, worth offering you----" He had taken her hand, and she had yielded it to him. He had put his great arm around her shoulders and drawn her to him,--and for a moment, with a little shiver, she had leant against him, almost cowered against him, with the air of a frightened child craving protection. But as he spoke on, in his quiet, strong voice, she suddenly tore herself away, sprang off to the other end of the pile of deals, and began to sob violently. He followed her at once. But she thrust out both hands. "Go away. _Please_ don't come near me," she appealed, somewhat wildly. "You don't understand--_anything_." Tug Blackstock looked puzzled. He seated himself at a distance of several inches, and clasped his hands resolutely in his lap. "Of course, I won't tech you, Mary," said he, "if you don't want me to. I don't want to do _anything_ you don't want me to--_never_, Mary. But I sure don't understand what you're crying for. _Please_ don't. I'm so sorry I teched you, dear. But if you knew how I love you, how I would give my life for you, I think you'd forgive me, Mary." Mary gave a bitter little laugh, and choked her sobs. "It isn't that, oh no, it isn't _that_!" she said. "I--I _liked_ it. There!" she panted. Then she sprang to her feet and faced him. And in the gloom he could see her eyes flaming with some intense excitement, from a face ghost-white. "But--I won't let you make me love you, Tug Blackstock. I won't!--I won't! I won't let you change all my plans, all my ambitions. I won't give up all I've worked for and schemed for and sold my very soul for, just because at last I've met a real man. Oh, I'd soon spoil your life, no matter how much you love me. You'd soon find how cruel, and hard, and selfish I am. An' I'd ruin my own life, too. Do you think I could settle down to spend my life in the backwoods? Do you think I have no dreams beyond the spruce woods of Nipsiwaska County? Do you think you could imprison _me_ in Brine's Rip? I'd either kill your brave, clean soul, Tug Blackstock, or I'd kill myself!" Utterly bewildered at this incomprehensible outburst, Blackstock could only stammer lamely: "But--I thought--ye kind o' liked Brine's Rip."