But even here she found evidences of her wise guide's care, for standing in front of the largest cedar were two tin cups of clear water and beside them a small pocket soap-case and a clean folded handkerchief, fine and white. He had done his best to supply her with toilet articles.
Her heart leaped up again at his thoughtfulness. She dashed the water into her glowing face, and buried it in the clean folds of the handkerchief--his handkerchief. How wonderful that it should be so! How had a mere commonplace bit of linen become so invested with the currents of life as to give such joyful refreshment with a touch? The wonder of it all was like a miracle. She had not known anything in life could be like that.
The great red cliff across the valley was touched with the morning sun when she emerged from her green shelter, shyly conscious of the secret that lay unrevealed between them.
Their little camp was still in the shadow. The last star had disappeared as if a hand had turned the lights low with a flash and revealed the morning.
She stood for an instant in the parting of the cedars, a hand on each side holding back the boughs, looking forth from her retreat; and the man advancing saw her and waited with bared head to do her reverence, a great light of love in his eyes which he knew not was visible, but which blinded the eyes of the watching girl, and made her cheeks grow rosier.
The very air about them seemed charged with an electrical current. The little commonplaces which they spoke sank deep into the heart of each and lingered to bless the future. The glances of their eyes had many meetings and lingered shyly on more intimate ground than the day before, yet each had grown more silent. The tenderness of his voice was like a benediction as he greeted her.
He seated her on the canvas he had arranged freshly beside a bit of green grass, and prepared to serve her like a queen. Indeed she wore a queenly bearing, small and slender though she was, her golden hair shining in the morning, and her eyes bright as the stars that had just been paled by day.
There were fried rabbits cooking in the tiny saucepan and corn bread was toasting before the fire on two sharp sticks. She found to her surprise that she was hungry, and that the breakfast he had prepared seemed a most delicious feast.
She grew secure in her consciousness that he did not know she had guessed his secret, and let the joy of it all flow over her and envelop her. Her laugh rang out musically over the plain, and he watched her hungrily, delightedly, enjoying every minute of the companionship with a kind of double joy because of the barren days that he was sure were to come.