have you and I stood here at the anvil, the fire heating the iron, and
our hammers falling constantly! Oh, Francis, I knew that only here with
God and His dumb creatures, and His wonderful healing world, all sun, and
wind, and flowers, and blossoming trees, working as you used to work, as
the first of men worked, would the sane wandering soul return to you. The
thought was in you, too, for you led me here, and have been patient also
in the awful exile of your mind."

"I have been as a child, and not as a man," he said gravely. "Shall I
ever again be a man, as I once was, Samantha?"

"You cannot see yourself," she said. "A week ago you fell ill, and since
then you have been pale and worn; but your body has been, and is, that of
a great strong man. In the morning I will take you to a spring in the
hills, and you shall see yourself, beloved."

He stood up, stretched himself, went to the door, and looked out into the
valley flooded with moonlight. He drew in a great draught of air, and
said: "The world--the great, wonderful world, where men live, and love
work, and do strong things!"--he paused, and turned with a trouble in his
face. "My wife," he said, "you have lived with a dead man twelve years,
and I have lost twelve years in the world. I had a great thought once--an
invention--but now--" he hung his head bitterly. She came to him, and her
hands slid up along his breast to his shoulders, and rested there; and
she said, with a glad smile: "Francis, you have lost nothing. The
thing--the invention--was all but finished when you fell ill a week ago.
We have worked at it for these twelve years; through it, I think, you
have been brought back to me. Come, there is a little work yet to, do
upon it;" and she drew him to where a machine of iron lay in the corner.
With a great cry he fell upon his knees beside it, and fondled it.