Snow-Blind

d hard and began to ta

woman. "He'll come to his senses. You know how moody he is. Come over here and doc

wollen and discolored. Bella clicked her tongue. "He is a brute, you know!" She laughed shortly. Since Garth's departure she had become almost a human being. Th

his brows. "Because he's such a kid, I gu

with him, Pete? He does tr

ike to be as kind as God. I believe if he could only fool us into

y, Pete. It's a sin you'v

me. He's taught me all he had in his head and a whole lot he never ought to hav

Garth was the only relation I ever had in the world that spoke kind to me. Remember how I used to run ov

ow. I remember Hugh's bookshop; yes, I do-honest! I remember sitting on the ladder and listening to him talk to the students when they came in. He always was a gorgeous talker, Bella. They used to sta

almost untouched meal. "Because he could put it over better with a

sed against his chest. His expression was indescribably sweet and boyish, the shadow of anxiety and pain accentuating a wistful if determined cheerfulness. He was

truth, Bella. You know you are. Yo

he said gloomily. "Things are

contemplated her. "What do you see when

shed. "Just because you cau

mirror, what would y

old wom

s. He won't see himself ugly, and you won't see your

member her. Besides, you're too young." She said it

ed imperceptibly into a vague pondering over his own youthfulness. That's what those two were always telling him, sometimes savagely, sometimes tende

they had lived. It was a few months later that Bella-Cousin Bella, who worked at "the farm"-came for him, a furtive, desperate Bella with a bruised face-a Bella tight-strung for flight, for a breaking of the galling accustomed ties of her li

uld trust. But no one must know where they were going. They must be away

s of trees-mazy and green and altogether bewildering. And after vague hop-o'-my-thumb wanderings, he had a disconnected memory of Hugh-a wild, rugged, ragged, bearded Hugh who caught him up fiercely as though he had an ogrish hunger for the feel of little boys. It was night when they came to Hugh's hiding-place. For miles Pete had been carried in his brother's arms. Bella had limped behind them. There had

not known then why strange men were creatures to be feared and shunned. In fact, he had never been told the reason for Hugh's flight. Only, bit by bit, he had pieced together hints and vague allusions until he knew that this strange, embittered, boasting

his magnificently desperate voice-attention would inevitably fasten upon him anywhere; how much more in an empty land such as this! Pete fancied the inquiring looks turned from the man to the man's posted picture. It was no longer a faithful likeness, of course; still, it was a likeness. There was no other man in all the world like Hugh! He was made of odd, fantastic fragments, of

earranging the ankle, and lifted his blue and h

t winter day was nearly done. There would be a l

s or buried ditches. He spent half of his wild young restlessness in such long night runs when, in a sort of ecstasy, he outraced the stifled longin

s own destruction? They might have held him by force, if not by argument, long enough to bring him to his senses. They had been weak; they were always weak before Hugh's magnetic st

istening, there came to Pete, acr

drift which rose just beyond the roof to a height of nine or ten feet, but listening int

ice ringing with relief. "Bella

violet sky darkening above the blue wall of snow, a bulky figure rose, blottin

panted Hugh

skis, he staggered past them and they saw