"Oh, the excitement--why, you must have been white-hot, to stand up to a wolf with nothing but a little stick. I didn't know it could happen that way, but I think it's not so strange." "Jesse Plum.... Why did Father never speak of those things?" "I don't know, Ru." "Did he to you?" "No, he never.... Look: I remember I spent once, merely from lifting a big rock. And--oh, tree-climbing, things like that. So you see--anyway there's nothing wrong with you, brother, nothing." "Do you have those dreams much, Ben?" "Not too often. You?" "Oh, they...." "You will. You'll be dreaming about girls, and----" "I ... You'll be strong enough to go on tomorrow, Ben. One thing: we needn't fret now about anyone following from Springfield. That snow will have covered everything. I hope they found the turkey blood before it began a-falling. We can go slowly, rest as soon as we come to another fair shelter. This morning might be the start of another thaw, even an early spring--only look at the tears of that spruce, how they fall in the sun! We'll find more food some-way, now that you're well. There must be towns between here and Roxbury, where we could work for a few meals, a few nights' rest." "Why, sure, we'll make it.... What happened to your jacket?" "My--oh, the wolf." "But the wolf did not reach you, brother." "I dragged her." "And so got your jacket torn and muddy on the inside? But I found it wrapped around my legs yesterday when I woke with a clear head, and you slipped it away, but I knew. Last night when it turned a little colder you put it around me again, thinking I was asleep, and I was silent, wishing to speak but too stupid." "No need. You'd have done the same. Don't speak of it now." "Very well. But----" "Thou owest me nothing. I've been forced to think of these things--so many hours, Ben, when I--nay, but how could there be any owing or standing beholden between thee and me?" "I think I owe thee everything." "No! Pray understand, Ben. It's not a thing to be measured--why, it's not a thing at all, but--oh, like a region one travels through, an area of light." "Love, a region?" "What else? Can you own it or give it or take it? It came to me, Ben, that we only dwell in it, as in the sun, or this morning air." PART TWO _Chapter One_ Ben Cory searched the bay, his eyes ardent for greater distances. Here at the wharf the ships relinquished wakefulness and power, becoming boxes of cargo for the calculations of landsmen: the harbor is not the sea.