famine. They must be hidden before my mistress discovered aught; and so
before her hour of waking we weighted and dropped the bodies overside
into deep water; for the ice had not yet wholly closed about us. Now as
I stooped, I suppose that my legs gave way beneath me. At any rate, I
fell; and in falling struck my head against the bulwarks, and opened my
eyes in that unending dusk to find the lady Mette stooping over me.

Then somehow I was aware that she had called for wine to force down my
throat, and had been told that there was no wine; and also that with
this answer had come to her the knowledge, full and sudden, of our case.
Better had we done to trust her than to hide it all this while, for she
turned to Ebbe, who stood at her shoulder, and "Is not this the feast of
Yule?" she asked. My master bent his head, but without answering.

"Ah!" she cried to him. "Now I know what I have longed to know, that
your love is less than mine, for you can love yet be doubtful of
miracles; while to me, now that I have loved, no miracle can be aught
but small." She bowed herself over me. "Art dying, old friend?
Look up and learn that God, being Love, deserts not lovers."

Then she stooped and gathered, as I thought, a handful of snow from the
deck; but lo! when she pressed it to my lips, and I tasted, it was
heavenly manna.

And looking up past her face I saw the ribbons of the North Lights fade
in a great and wide sunlight, bathing the deck and my frozen limbs.
Nor did they feel it only, but on the wind came the noise of bergs
rending, springs breaking, birds singing, many and curious. And with
that, as I am a sinful man, I gazed up into green leaves; for either we
had sailed into Paradise or the timbers of the _White Wolf_ were