fir--shade to shade--and only the coral tip of it remained strongly
visible. This matched the last coral in the sunset; and it seemed to
rest ominously above her head as a finger-point of the fading light of
Nature.

He went quickly around to her. He locked his arms around her and drew
her close and held her close; and thus for a while the two stood,
watching the flame on the altar of the world as it sank lower, leaving
emptiness and ashes.

Once she put out a hand and with a gesture full of majesty and
nobleness waved farewell to the dying fire.

Still without a word he took his arms from around her and turned
energetically to the tree.

He pressed the lowest boughs aside and made his way in close to the
trunk and struck it with a keen stroke.

The fir as he drew the axe out made at its gashed throat a sound like
that of a butchered, blood-strangled creature trying to cry out too
late against a treachery. A horror ran through the boughs; the
thousands of leaves were jarred by the death-strokes; and the top of
it rocked like a splendid plume too rudely treated in a storm. Then it
fell over on its side, bridging blackly the white ice of the brook.

Stooping, he lifted it triumphantly. He set the butt-end on one of his
shoulders and, stretching his arms up, grasped the trunk and held the
tree straight in the air, so that it seemed to be growing out of his
big shoulder as out of a ledge of rock. Then he turned to her and