A curtain had fallen before the glowing future. Peter couldn't raise it again. He tried to restore his laugh and light-heartedness for the others, but it was a mockery. The world had come in all its chaos and mad fatigue. All that he had said was without meaning. The singing was over. Berthe gave him her hand as he returned to the dark corner. She did not speak, for a moment, and then only to say:
All the weariness that he had ever known came upon him, gathering together for descent, pressing out vitality, leaving him cold and undone.
“You are very tired,” she whispered. “Perhaps we can rest a little. The three are resting.” Then a little later, like a child half-asleep, she added, “I love you.”
Throughout that short night he dreamed of cedar boughs and pungent autumn air; flurries of snow falling from wide pine branches. There was gray in the skylight when he awoke. Berthe was near, her cheek against his saddle bags, which he had placed for her the last thing. Very white and small her face looked as she slept, her hands folded under her chin.... Peter watched, his eyes becoming accustomed to the faint light. The white cap lay near, a different and imperfect white compared to her flesh; and the soft deep night of her hair seemed to him of sufficient loveliness for any world. A girl asleep--and such a faith had they known. There was a beauty about it all that rebuked the actuality of the place and the town and the soldiery.
Misery began deep in his heart, welled up to his throat, blurring his eyes, resolving his whole nature almost past resistance; that a love-woman still without her chance, without her child, so fair and unafraid, who had asked so little for herself and so much for the world--should be brought to the shame and the shot of fools. A flutter of eyes. Mowbray gripped his self-control with every ounce of force. He would hold her in his power of will while she met the issue of the day, and its first cruel thought. Her brow contracted a little, as if through some passing pain.... The dawn of a smile that pursed her lips to speak his name, met his kiss instead. He held her face between his hands, smiling at her, while the realization came.
_“Dear Peter--it's the day of our journey--“_