cannot talk to them of honor and warfare and the wide world." His speech
was sombre, but in his eyes there was an eagerness not without pathos.

The mood of the Gael chimed with the present mood of the Saxon. As unlike
in their natures as their histories, men would have called them; and yet,
far away, in dim recesses of the soul, at long distances from the flesh,
each recognised the other. And it was an evening, too, in which to take
care of other things than the ways and speech of every day. The heat, the
hush, and the stillness appeared well-nigh preternatural. A sadness
breathed over the earth; all things seemed new and yet old; across the
spectral river the dim plains beneath the afterglow took the seeming of
battlefields.

"A friend!" said Haward. "There are many men who call themselves my
friends. I am melancholy to-day, restless, and divided against myself. I
do not know one of my acquaintance whom I would have called to be
melancholy with me as I have called you." He leaned across the table and
touched MacLean's hand that was somewhat hurriedly fingering the
wineglass. "Come!" he said. "Loneliness may haunt the level fields as well
as the ways that are rugged and steep. How many times have we held
converse since that day I found you in charge of my store? Often enough, I
think, for each to know the other's quality. Our lives have been very
different, and yet I believe that we are akin. For myself, I should be
glad to hold as my friend so gallant though so unfortunate a gentleman."
He smiled and made a gesture of courtesy. "Of course Mr. MacLean may very
justly not hold me in a like esteem, nor desire a closer relation."

MacLean rose to his feet, and stood gazing across the river at the
twilight shore and the clear skies. Presently he turned, and his eyes were
wet. He drew his hand across them; then looked curiously at the dew upon
it. "I have not done this," he said simply, "since a night at Preston when
I wept with rage. In my country we love as we hate, with all the strength
that God has given us. The brother of my spirit is to me even as the
brother of my flesh.... I used to dream that my hand was at your throat or
my sword through your heart, and wake in anger that it was not so ... and
now I could love you well."

Haward stood up, and the two men clasped hands. "It is a pact, then," said
the Englishman. "By my faith, the world looks not so melancholy gray as it
did awhile ago. And here is Juba to say t