ch in the army--do anything he wants 'em to. He's as hard himself as
ever is, but he's all right underneath the epidermotis."

All at once there flashed before Jasmine's eyes the picture of Rudyard
driving Krool out of the house in Park Lane with a sjambok. She heard
again the thud of the rhinoceros-whip on the cringing back of the Boer;
she heard the moan of the victim as he stumbled across the threshold
into the street; and again she felt that sense of suffocation, that
excitement which the child feels on the brink of a wonderful romance,
the once-upon-a-time moment.

They were nearing the hospital. The driver silently pointed to it. He
saw that he had made an impression, and he was content with it. He
smiled to himself.

"Is Colonel Byng in the camp?" she asked.

"He's over--'way over, miles and miles, on the left wing with Kearey's
brigade now. But old Gunter's here, and you're sure to see Colonel Byng
soon--well, I should think."

She had no wish to see Colonel Byng soon. Three days would suffice to
do what she wished here, and then she would return to Durban to her
work there--to Alice Tynemouth, whose friendship and wonderful
tactfulness had helped her in indefinable ways, as a more obvious
sympathy never could have done. She would have resented one word which
would have suggested that a tragedy was slowly crushing out her life.

Never a woman in the world was more alone. She worked and smiled with
eyes growing sadder, yet with a force hardening in her which gave her
face a character it never had before. Work had come at the right moment
to save her from the wild consequences of a nature maddened by a series
of misfortunes and penalties, for which there had been no warning and
no preparation.

She was not ready for a renewal of the past. Only a few minutes before
she had been brought face to face with Ian Stafford, had seen him look
at her out of the shadow there at the station, as though she was an
infinite distance away from him; and she had realized with overwhelming
force how changed her world was. Ian Stafford, who but a few short
months ago had held her in his arms and whispered unforgettable things,
now looked at her as one looks at the image of a forgotten thing. She
recalled his last words to her that awful day when Rudyard had read the
fatal letter, and the world had fallen:

"Nothing can set things right between you and me, Jasmine," he had
said. "But there is Rudyard. You must help him throug