ldren together, for
he is about a dozen years my senior, but we have known each other all
our lives. And, by the way, Violet, I hope you have not been
intentionally adding him to the list of your captives; but I am
tolerably certain he has fallen a victim. Whether it is your doing, or
pure accident, I don't undertake to guess. But he is not the sort of
man you ought to make a fool of."

Violet laughed--mockingly, maliciously.

"Why, Marian, you're jealous. I've struck the right chord at last.
Never mind; it isn't too late now. I won't stand in your light, I
promise you."

Most women under the circumstances would have fired up--repelled the
insinuation angrily. But Marian Selwood was not of that sort.

"Poor Renshaw is quite unlucky enough, without having a--well--damaged
heart thrown into the scale," she went on. "His life is hard enough in
all conscience, and is just now a well-nigh hopeless struggle, I don't
mind telling you in confidence. I dare say you think there isn't much
in him because he is reserved; but more than once his cool courage has
been the means of saving not one life, but many. I have heard men say,
not once, not yet twice, that in any undertaking involving peril or
enterprise there is no man they would rather have at their side than
Renshaw Fanning. And he is the most unselfish of men. His is a
splendid character, and one not often met with in these days."

"Well done! Well done, Marian!" cried Violet, mischievously. "The
secret is out at last. I know where Mr Fanning's trumpeter lives.
But, joking apart, he is awfully nice, only a trifle too solemn, you
know, like yourself; in fact, you would suit each other admirably.
There now, don't get huffy. I assure you I quite missed him for ever so
long after he left. How long is it since he left?"

"Just over five weeks."

"As long as that, is it? Well, I wish he'd come again; there, is that
an adequate tribute to your Bayard? But I suppose he won't be able to
come all that distance again--hundreds of miles, isn't it?--for ever so
long--and then I shall be gone--Oh! Look there! Look, Marian, look!"
she broke off, her voice rising to a scream, as she pointed,
terror-stricken, to an object rising out of the grass some twenty yards
distant.

CHAPTER FIVE.

A SUSPICIOUS TREK.

Marian, startled by the terrified shriek of her companion, followed the
latter's gaze, and the object that met her own produced a qualm of
repulsion