laughed out in his strength and youth. She laughed joyously back at
him, glorying as he did.

With a robust re-shouldering of the tree to make it more comfortable
to carry, he turned and started up the hill toward the house. As she
followed behind, the old mystery of the woods seemed at last to have
taken bodily possession of him. The fir was riding on his shoulder,
its arms met fondly around his neck, its fingers were caressing his
hair. And it whispered back jeeringly to her through the twilight:

"Say farewell to him! He was once yours; he is yours no longer. He
dandles the child of the forest on his shoulder instead of his
children by you in the house. He belongs to Nature; and as Nature
calls, he will always follow--though it should lead over the precipice
or into the flood. Once Nature called him to you: remember how he
broke down barriers until he won you. Now he is yours no longer--say
good-by to him!"

With an imbued terror and desolation, she caught up with him. By a
movement so soft that he should not be aware, she plucked him by the
coat sleeve on the other side from the fir and held on to him as he
strode on in careless joy.

Halfway up the hill lights began to flash from the windows of the
house: a servant was bringing in the lamps. It was at this hour, in
just this way, that she had first caught sight of them on that
Christmas Eve when he had brought her home after the wedding.

She hurried around in front of him, wishing to read the expression of
his eyes by the distant gleams from the windows. Would they have