anew before his eyes. The hard
peasant life, in contact with the soil and natural forces; the elemental
facts of birth and motherhood, of daily toil and suffering; what it
means to fight oppressors for freedom, and see your dearest--son, lover,
wife, betrothed--die horribly amid the clash of arms; into this caldron
of human fate had Kitty plunged her light soul; and in some ways Ashe
scarcely knew her again.

She recurred often to the story of a youth, handsome and beardless, who
had been wounded by a stray Turkish shot in the course of the long climb
to the village where she nursed. He had managed to gain the height, and
then, killed by the march as much as by the shot, he had sunk down to
die on the ground-floor of the house where Kitty lived.

"He was a stranger--no one knew him in the village--no one cared. They
had their own griefs. I dressed his wound--and gave him water. He
thought I was his mother, and asked me to kiss him. I kissed him,
William--and he smiled once--before the last hemorrhage. If you had seen
the cold, dismal room--and his poor face!"

Ashe gathered her to his breast. And after a while she said, with closed
eyes:

"Oh, what pain there is in the world, William!--what <i>pain</i>! That's
what--I never knew."

* * * * *

The evening wore on. All the noises ceased down-stairs. One by one the
guests came up the stone stairs and along the creaking corridor. Boots
were thrown out; the doors closed. The strokes of eleven o'clock rang
out from the village campanile; and amid the quiet of the now drizzling
rain the echoes of the bell lingered on the ear. Last of all a woman's
step passed the door--stopped at the door of Kitty's room, as though
some one listened, and then gently returned. "Fraeulein Anna!" said
Kitty--"she's a good soul."

Soon nothing was heard but the roar of the flooded stream on one side of
the old narrow building and the dripping of rain on the other. Their low
voices were amply covered by these sounds. The night lay before them,
safe and undisturbed. Candles burned on the mantel-piece, and on a table
behind Kitty's head was a paraffine lamp. She seemed to have a craving
for light.

"Kitty!" said Ashe, suddenly bending over her--"understand! I shall
never leave you again."

She started, her head fell back on his arm, and her brown eyes
considered him:

"William! I saw the <i>Standard</i> at Geneva. Aren't you going home--because
of politic