“‘It is magic,’ she answered. “‘Shall I throw it?’ said I, lifting the stone, ‘shall I throw it away, for fear?’ “‘It shines!’ she cried, looking up. ‘It shines like the eye of a creature at night, the eye of a wolf in the doorway.’ “‘’Tis magic,’ I said, ‘let me throw it from us.’ But nay, she held my arm. “‘It is red and shining,’ she cried. “‘It is a bloodstone,’ I answered. ‘It will hurt us, we shall die in blood.’ “‘But give it to me,’ she answered. “‘It is red of blood,’ I said. “‘Ah, give it to me,’ she called. “‘It is my blood,’ I said. “‘Give it,’ she commanded, low. “‘It is my life-stone,’ I said. “‘Give it me,’ she pleaded. “‘I gave it her. She held it up, she smiled, she smiled in my face, lifting her arms to me. I took her with my mouth, her mouth, her white throat. Nor she ever shrank, but trembled with happiness. “What woke us, when the woods were filling again with shadow, when the fire was out, when we opened our eyes and looked up as if drowned, into the light which stood bright and thick on the tree-tops, what woke us was the sound of wolves....” “Nay,” said the vicar, suddenly rising, “they lived happily ever after.” “No,” I said. The Shades of Spring I It was a mile nearer through the wood. Mechanically, Syson turned up by the forge and lifted the field-gate. The blacksmith and his mate stood still, watching the trespasser. But Syson looked too much a gentleman to be accosted. They let him go in silence across the small field to the wood. There was not the least difference between this morning and those of the bright springs, six or eight years back. White and sandy-gold fowls still scratched round the gate, littering the earth and the field with feathers and scratched-up rubbish. Between the two thick holly bushes in the wood-hedge was the hidden gap, whose fence one climbed to get into the wood; the bars were scored just the same by the keeper’s boots. He was back in the eternal. Syson was extraordinarily glad. Like an uneasy spirit he had returned to the country of his past, and he found it waiting for him, unaltered. The hazel still spread glad little hands downwards, the bluebells here were still wan and few, among the lush grass and in shade of the bushes.