es till they came in sight of the
lights of La Closerie.

Then he bent into the sun-bonnet and sealed his capture of the virginal
fortress by a passionate kiss on the tremulous little lips. And she,
with the frankness of a child, reached up and kissed him warmly back.

"Good-night, dear, and God bless you!" he said fervently.

"Can you find your way in the dark?"

"There is the moon. I shall be all right."

She bent her head and ran on towards the lights. He watched her go in at
the door, and turned and went back along the lane, and his heart was
high with the joy that was in him.

CHAPTER XV

HOW TWO FELL OUT

It was but a thin strip of a moon that had risen above the evening
mists--a mere sickle of red gold--but such as it was it sufficed to lift
the pall of darkness from the earth and set the black sky back into its
proper place.

To Gard the night had suddenly become spacious and ample, and the
peaceful slip of a moon, which grew paler and brighter every minute, was
full of promise.

He was so full of Nance that he had almost forgotten Tom and his
scurrilous insolences.

He crossed the Coupee without any difficulty, enjoyed over again the
recollection of that last crossing, and stood in the cutting on the Sark
side for a moment to marvel at the change an hour had made in his
outlook on things in general.

Tom? Why, he could almost forgive Tom, for it was he who had helped to
bring matters to a head--unconsciously, indeed, and probably quite
against his wish. Still, he had been the instrument--the drop of acid in
the solution which had crystallized their love into set form and made it
visible, and fixed it for life.

Truly, he was half inclined to consider himself under obligation to
Tom--if only his boorishness could be kept in check for the future. For,
of a certainty, he was not going to allow Nance to be made miserable by
his loutish insolences.

He had climbed the cutting and was on the level, when he heard heavy
footsteps coming towards him, and the next moment he was face to face
with the object of his thoughts.

Possibly Tom had expected to meet him and had been preparing for the
fray, for he opened at once with a volley of patois which to Gard was so
much blank cartridge.

"Oh--ho, le velas--corrupteur! Amuseur! Seducteur! Ou quais noutre
fille? Quais qu'on avait fait d'elle d'on?"

"Quite finished?" asked Gard quietly, as the other came to a stop for
want of breath. "Say it a