They followed it down through tangled woods and when they camped late one evening, Agatha sat silent by the fire, trying to retrace their journey and speculating about what lay ahead.

For the most part, her memory was blurred, and hazy pictures floated through her mind of lonely camps among the boulders and small pine-trunks, of breathless men dragging the canoes up angry rapids, and carrying heavy loads across slippery rocks.

Their track across the wilderness was marked by little heaps of ashes and white chips scattered about fallen trees.
But some of the memories were sharp; there was the evening she found Thirlwell carrying her belongings a double stage in order that she might have all she needed when they camped.

He panted as he leaned against a tree and his face and hair were wet; she felt moved but angry that he had exhausted himself for her.

She did not want him to think she knew what her comfort cost and was willing to let him buy it at such a price.
She remembered that she had begun to speculate rather often about what he thought.
Then there was the morning they saw a half-covered rock a few yards off in the foam of a furious rapid.