est he should see that which would tell him Bridget was dead.

But the dead do not speak in syllables that an ordinary human ear can
hear. And Colin heard his own name spoken in accents piercingly clear
and sweet.

'Colin.'

To him, though, it was as a ghost-voice. He stood transfixed. And just
then the dog bounded past him. It had flown up the steps barking
loudly. That could be no immaterial form upon which the creature flung
itself, pawing, nosing, licking with the wildest demonstrations of joy.

He heard the well-remembered tones:

'Quiet Veno.... Good dog.... Lie down Veno--Lie down.'

The dog seemed to understand that this was not a moment for
effusiveness. Without another sound, it crouched upon its haunches
gazing up at the new-comer.

Then Colin turned. Bridget was standing not a yard from him. A slender
figure in a grey silk cloak, with bare head--she had flung back her
grey sun-bonnet and shrouding gauze veil.... He saw the face he
knew--the small, pale face; the shadowy eyes, wide and bright with an
ecstatic determination, yet in them a certain feminine timorousness;
the little pointed chin poked slightly forward; the red-brown hair--all
untidy curls and tendrils, each hair seeming to have a life and
magnetism of its own. It was just as he had so often pictured her in
dreams of sleep and waking.

He gazed at her like one who beholds a vision from another world. And
then a great sob burst from him--the pitiful sob of a strong man who is
beaten, broken with emotion. The whole being of the man seemed to
collapse. He staggered forward, and such a change came over the gaunt,
hard face, that Bridget saw it through a rain of tears which fell down
her cheeks.

'Oh, Colin--Won't you speak to me?'

'Biddy!' He went close to her and gripped her two wrists, holding her
before him while his hungry eyes seemed to be devouring her.

'It's you--it's really you. You're not dead, are you?'

'Dead! Oh no--no.... I've come home.'

'Home!' He laughed.

'Oh don't--don't,' she cried. 'Don't laugh like that.'

'Home!' he repeated, grimly. 'Look round you. A nice sort of home. Eh?'

'I don't care. It's the only real home I've ever had.'

'But look--look!'

She followed his eyes to the great pyre in the garden, with the dead
leaves, and the pieces of furniture, the squatters' chairs, the little
tables he and she had covered together, the hammock that he had cut
down leaving the ropes dangling--many other things