preservation. I could hardly even have bolted, for I was laid up
with fever, and was very shaky on my legs."

"I suppose, however," said Rachel, "that the vision of one's life in
entering the army would be to win that sort of distinction, and so
young."

"Win it as some have done," said Alick, "and deserve what is far better
worth than distinction. That may be the dream, but, after all, it is
the discipline and constant duty that make the soldier, and are far more
really valuable than exceptional doings."

"People must always be ready for them, though," said Rachel

"And they are," said Alick, with grave exultation in his tone.

Then, after a pause, she led back the conversation to its personal
character, by saying. "Do you mean that the reception of this cross was
no gratification to you?"

"No, I am not so absurd," he replied, but he added sadly, "That was
damped quite otherwise. The news that I was named for it came almost in
the same breath with that of my father's death, and he had not heard I
was to receive it."

"Ah! I can understand."

"And you can see how intolerable was the fuss my good relations made
with me just when the loss was fresh on me, and with that of my two
chief friends, among my brother officers, fellows beside whom I was
nobody, and there was my uncle's blindness getting confirmed. Was not
that enough to sicken one with being stuck up for a lion, and constantly
poked up by the showwoman, under pretext of keeping up one's spirits!"

"And you were--I mean were you--too ill to escape?"

"I was less able to help myself than Miss Williams is. There had been
a general smash of all the locomotive machinery on this side, and the
wretched monster could do nothing but growl at his visitors."

"Should you growl very much if I introduced you to Emily Grey? You
see it is a matter of justice and truth to tell her now, after having
contradicted her so flatly. I will wait to let you get out of the way
first if you like, but I think that would be unkind to her; and if you
ever do dance, I wish you would dance with her."

"With all my heart," he answered.

"Oh, thank you," said Rachel, warmly.

He observed with some amusement Rachel's utter absence of small
dexterities, and of even the effort to avoid the humiliation of a
confession of her error. Miss Grey and a boy partner had wandered into
the conservatory, and were rather dismally trying to seem occupied with
the camellias when Rachel made her