d
now and then some wide-winged bird floating, aslant, from peak to peak.
There was peace, peace everywhere, and he went back from the dizzy edge
of the precipice to the side of the Arrow. Lannes still slept heavily,
and John appreciated his great need of it, knowing how frightful his
strain must have been during that long night.

He felt that he was wholly in Lannes' hands, and he did not know the
young Frenchman's plans. He might wish to get away early, but John
resolved to let him sleep. Whatever they undertook and wherever they
went strength and steadiness must be of the utmost importance, and
Lannes alone could take them on their flight.

John leaned against a little hillock and watched the country that rolled
northward. For the first time in hours he thought of his uncle and Mr.
Anson. And yet he was so filled with wonder at his own translation into
another element that he did not worry greatly about them. They would
hear of him soon, he felt sure, and in a time of such vast anxiety and
fear for half a world brief apprehension about a single person amounted
to but little.

He dozed a short while, and then awoke with a start and an effort of the
will. Lannes still slept like one dead. He felt that the young Frenchman
and the _Arrow_ were in his care, and he must fail in nothing. He stood
up and walked about in the pocket, shaking the dregs of sleep from his
brain. The sun doubled in size from that height, was sweeping toward the
zenith. The radiant sky contained nothing but those tiny clouds floating
like white sails on a sea of perfect blue. The gold on the snow of the
far peaks deepened. He was suffused with the beauty of it, and, for a
little space the world war and the frightful calamities it would bring
fled quite away.

Lannes awoke about noon, stood up, stretched his limbs and sighed with
deep content. He cast a questing glance at the heavens, and then turned
a satisfied look on John.

"No enemy in sight," he said, "and I have slept well. Yea, more, I tell
you, Yankee that you are, that I have slept magnificently. It was a
glorious bed on that grass under the edge of the cliff, and since I may
return some day I'll remember it as one of the finest inns in Europe.
Have you seen anything while I slept, Monsieur Jean the Scott?"

"Only the peaks, the hills, the blue sky and three or four big birds
which I was unable to classify."

"Let their classification go. When we classify now we classify nothing
le