meaning to take what offered. Do you deem me vile, Euan?”

“No — no — “ I could not utter another word.

She sighed, gazing at space.

“And the cold! Well — this is July, and I must try to put it from my mind. But at times it seems to be still in my bones — deep bitten to the very marrow. Ai-me! I have seen two years of centuries. Their scars remain.”

She rocked slightly forward and backward where she sat, her fingers interlaced, twisting and clenching with her memories.

“Ai-me! Hunger and cold and men! Hunger and — men. But it was solitude that nigh undid me. That was the worst of all — the endless silence.”