But he brushed that impression away as foolish. Her words had the
unmistakable note of cultivation, while a glance at her person showed her
to be a lady. He could see, too, that her dress, though simple, was
according to the standard of means and fashion. She was no Pocahontas;
and yet the thought of Pocahontas came to him. Certainly there was in her
tones, as well as in her movements, something akin to this vast aboriginal
nature around him, out of which she seemed to spring as the human element
in its beauty.

He was still thinking of this when the door opened and she came in again,
carrying a plate piled high with cold meat and bread-and-butter.

"I'm sorry it's only this," she smiled, as she placed it before him; "but
I had to take what I could get--and what wouldn't be missed. I'll try to
do better in future."

He noted the matter-of-fact tone in which she uttered the concluding
words, as though they were to have plenty of time together; but for the
moment he was too fiercely hungry to speak. For a few seconds she stood
off, watching him eat, after which she withdrew, with the light swiftness
that characterized all her motions.

He had nearly finished his meal when she returned again.

"I've brought you these," she said, not without a touch of shyness,
against which she struggled by making her tone as commonplace as possible.
"I shall bring you more things by degrees."

On a chair beside that on which he was sitting she laid a pair of