"Very well!" Truedale smiled weakly. "Why?" "I'm right hungry. I--I want a party." Of course this would never do. White, or one of the blood-and-thunder raiders, might appear. "You must go, Nella-Rose." "Not"--here she sat down firmly and undid her ridiculous plaid shawl--"not till you give me a bite. Just a mighty little bite--I'm starving!" At this Truedale roared with laughter and went hurriedly to his closet. The girl must eat and--_go_. Mechanically he set about placing food upon the table. Then he sat opposite Nella-Rose while she ate with frank enjoyment the remains of his own noon-day meal. He could not but note, as he often did, the daintiness with which she accomplished the task. Other women, as Truedale remembered, were not prepossessing when attacking food; but this girl made a gracious little ceremony of the affair. She placed the small dishes in orderly array before her; she poised herself lightly on the edge of the chair and nibbled--there was no other word for it--as a perky little chipmunk might, the morsels she raised gracefully to her mouth. She was genuinely hungry and for a few minutes devoted her attention to the matter in hand. Then, suddenly, Nella-Rose did something that shattered the last scrap of self-control that was associated with the trusty Kendall and his good example. She raised a bit of food on her fork and held it out to Truedale, her lovely eyes looking wistfully into his. "Please! I feel so ornery eating alone. I want to--share! Please play party with me!" Truedale tried to say "I had my dinner an hour ago"; instead, he leaned across his folded arms and murmured, as if quite outside his own volition: "I--I love you!" Nella-Rose dropped the fork and leaned back. Her lids fell over the wide eyes--the smile faded from her lips. "Do you belong to any one--else, Nella-Rose?" "No--oh! no." This like a frightened cry. "But others--some one must have told you--of love. Do you know what love means?" "Yes." "How?" And now she looked at him. Her eyes were dark, her face deadly pale; her lips were so red that in the whiteness they seemed the only trace of colour. "How do I know? Why because--nothing else matters. It seems like I've been coming all my life to it--and now it just says: 'Here I am, Nella-Rose--here'!" "I, too, have been coming to it all my life, little girl. I did not know--I was driven. I rebelled, because I did not know; but nothing else _does_ matter, when--love gets you!" "No. Nothing matters." The girl's voice was rapt and dreamy. Truedale put his hands across the space dividing them and took hold of hers. "You will be--mine, Nella-Rose?" "Seems like I must be!" "Yes. Doesn't it? Do you--you must understand, dear? I mean to live the rest of my life here in the hills--your hills. You once said one was of the hills or one wasn't; will they let me stay?" "Yes"--almost fiercely--"but--but your folks--off there--will they let you stay?"