Then a little later he saved her from a large black spider, which had caught itself in the wavy hair on the nape of her neck.

At this all her womanly nature reappeared, and she shrieked with terror.

"How stupid it was to be afraid of a spider!" she exclaimed a moment afterwards; yet, in spite of her efforts to master herself, she remained pale and trembling.
Silence at last fell between them, and they looked at one another with a smile.

In the midst of that delicate greenery they felt drawn together by frank affection--the affection of brother and sister, so it seemed to them.

It made Marie very happy to think that she had taken an interest in Pierre, and that his return to health was largely her own work.