The burning wood stirred uneasily, a flame leapt, and Theresa saw the hand, pallid in the fierce glow, still working on the dog's head. The flame sank, and the small sounds in the kitchen, the clink of teacups and the dull drumming of a light wind at the pane, added to her sense of mysterious and impending happenings. She sat here, at last, in the kitchen she seemed to have known all her life. Above her, on the mantelpiece, her own eyes looked down, smiling in comradeship and welcome and amusement at her surprise. Those photographs had been sent without her knowledge and she felt strangely at a disadvantage. For all these years Alexander had been familiar with her looks, while to her he was still a vague form, perpetually menacing an exacter shape. She was like someone who has thought herself alone and finds all her actions watched. But Alexander was away, and she would not have to meet the scrutiny that compared reality with pictures. If she had not been assured of that she would not have been here among the hills. But--happiness triumphed above discomfiture--she was undeniably here! The smell of burning wood was in her nostrils and, outside, the hills were powerfully, peacefully asleep under their caps of snow. She was here, with the freshness of the mountain air on her cheeks, while, in the warm west, Grace was a three days' bride. But on the thought of that surrender Theresa would not dwell. She felt she was having her revenge on Alexander, when, having been lighted up the stairs by his father, she closed the door of his room; for if he had been able to study her face during all these years, she could now retort with an examination of his belongings. His books, she considered, would be quite as tell-tale as her appearance--and then she caught back her thoughts. He had probably never so much as glanced at the mantelpiece, and why should she be curious as to his tastes? She went to the window, and, kneeling before it, undressed with hasty hands. She saw the fields and the mountains, and a great moon swung in heaven: she had realized a dream, but her one wish was to put out the light and draw the bedclothes close about her head, and lose consciousness of this room which moved her like a presence.