of Rene de Ronville. Surely some one of her friends must know
something about him. Ah, there was Oncle Jazon! Doubtless he could tell
her all that she wanted to know. She lingered, after the food was
distributed, and shyly inquired.

"Hain't seed the scamp," said Oncle Jazon, only he used the patois most
familiar to the girl's ear. "Killed an' scelped long ago, I reckon."

His mouth was so full that he spoke mumblingly and with utmost
difficulty. Nor did he glance at Adrienne, whose face took on as great
pallor as her brown complexion could show.

Beverley ate but little of the food. He sat apart on a piece of timber
that projected from the rough breastwork and gave himself over to
infinite misery of spirit, which was trebled when he took Alice's
locket from his bosom, only to discover that the bullet which struck
him had almost entirely destroyed the face of the miniature.

He gripped the dinted and twisted case and gazed at it with the stare
of a blind man. His heart almost ceased to beat and his breath had the
rustling sound we hear when a strong man dies of a sudden wound.
Somehow the defacement of the portrait was taken by his soul as the
final touch of fate, signifying that Alice was forever and completely
obliterated from his life. He felt a blur pass over his mind. He tried
in vain to recall the face and form so dear to him; he tried to imagine
her voice; but the whole universe was a vast hollow silence. For a long
while he was cold, staring, rigid; then the inevitable collapse came,
and he wept as only a strong man can who is hurt to death, yet cannot
die.

Adrienne approached him, thinking to speak to him about Rene; but he
did not notice her, and she went her way, leaving beside him a liberal
supply of food.

CHAPTER XX

ALICE'S FLAG

Governor Hamilton received the note sent him by Colonel Clark and
replied to it with curt dignity; but his heart was quaking. As a
soldier he was true to the military tradition, and nothing could have
induced him to surrender his command with dishonor.

"Lieutenant-Governor Hamilton," he wrote to Clark, "begs leave to
acquaint Colonel Clark that he and his garrison are not disposed to be
awed into any action unworthy of British subjects."

"Very brave words," said Helm, when Hamilton read the note to him, "but
you'll sing a milder tune before many minutes, or you and your whole
garrison will perish in a bloody heap. Listen to those wild yells!
Clark has eno