might have reason to, Monsieur," retorted the girl demurely. "But
you see it's Djack who is convalescing, not you."

She had become accustomed to the ceaseless banter of Burley's two
comrades--a banter entirely American, and which at first she was unable to
understand. But now all things American, including accent and odd,
perverted humour, had become very dear to her. The clink-clank of the
muleteer's big spurs always set her heart beating; the sight of an
arriving convoy from the Channel port thrilled her, and to her the trample
of mules, the shouts of foreign negroes, the drawling, broken French
spoken by the white muleteers made heavenly real to her the dream which
love had so suddenly invaded, and into which, as suddenly, strode Death,
clutching at Love.

She had beaten him off--she had--or God had--routed Death, driven him from
the dream. For it was a dream to her still, and she thought she could
never be able to comprehend the magic reality of it, even when at last her
man, "Djack," came back to prove the blessed miracle which held her in the
magic of its thrall.

------------------

"Who's the guy with the wheelbarrow?" inquired Sticky Smith, rolling a
cigarette.

"Karl, his name is," she answered; "--a Belgian refugee."

"He looks like a Hun to me," remarked Glenn, bluntly.

"He has his papers," said the girl.

Glenn shrugged.

"With his little pink eyes of a pig and his whitish hair and
eyebrows--well, maybe they make 'em like that in Belgium."

"Papers," added Smith, "_can_ be swiped."

The girl shook her head:

"He's an invalid student from Ypres. He looks quite ill, I think."

"He looks the lunger, all right. But Huns have it, too. What does he
do--wander about town at will?"

"He works for us, monsieur. Your suspicions are harsh. Karl is quite
harmless, poor boy."

"What does he do after hours?" demanded Sticky Smith, watching the
manoeuvres of the sickly blond youth and the wheelbarrow.

"Monsieur Smith, if you knew how innocent is his pastime!" she exclaimed,
laughing. "He collects and studies moths and butterflies. Is there, if you
please, a mania more harmless in the world?... And now I must return to my
work, messieurs."

As the two muleteers strode clanking away toward the canal in the meadow,
the blond youth turned his head and looked after them out of eyes which
were naturally pale and small, and which, as he watched the two Americans,
seemed to gr