? ? ? ? The second hut was easier to erect, for I built it against the first and only three walls were required. But it was work, hard work, all of it. Maud and I worked from dawn till dark, to the limit of our strength, so that when night came we crawled stiffly to bed and slept the animal-like sleep of exhaustion. And yet she declared that she had never felt better nor stronger in her life. I knew this was true of myself, but hers was such a lily strength that I feared she would break down. Often and often, her last reserve force gone, I have seen her stretched flat on her back on the sand, in the way she had of resting and recuperating. And then she would be up on her feet and toiling as hard as ever. Where she obtained this strength was a marvel to me.
? ? ? ? 'Think of the long rest this winter,' was her reply to my remonstrances. 'Why, we'll be clamorous for something to do.'
? ? ? ? We held a housewarming in my hut the night it was roofed. It was the end of the third day of a fierce storm that had swung around the compass from the southeast to the northwest, and that was then blowing directly in upon us.
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