into the
brightness of a log-walled hall and grew faint, while a tingling pain
ran through her with the change of temperature. A woman whom she did
not know clumsily took her wrappings from her, and then led her into a
room where Seaforth drew a chair up to a table beside the stove. Alice
Deringham's head was throbbing, but she could see that he was white and
haggard.

"How is he?" she said, and the tingling pain grew more pronounced as
she waited the answer.

Seaforth's face was very grave. "I think it is touch and go with
him--but if he wears the night out he may pull through. It was very
good of you to come."

Alice Deringham made a little gesture of impatience. "But there is
hope?" she said, and her voice was very low and strained.

Seaforth glanced round sharply as the woman, knocking over something,
went out of the room.

"A little, I believe, if he could sleep," he said huskily. "The doctor
is with him now--scarcely left him the last four days. We have nobody
to help us. Mrs. Margery broke down. The woman you saw is incapable.
Harry has been delirious--and asking for you--half the time."

Seaforth looked at his companion as he spoke, and the girl met his gaze
directly. There was no room for anything but frankness at such a time.

"Ah," she said simply. "I am glad I came."

Seaforth's eyes seemed to grow a little misty, and Alice Deringham, who
suddenly looked aside, wondered whether it was only the effect of
weariness. Whatever he felt, he, however, quietly poured something
into a cup and handed it to her. "But you must eat," he said.

Hungry and cold as she had been, the girl could eat but little, though
the steaming liquid in the cup put a little life into her, and
presently she rose up and shook off the coarse shawl which somebody had
wrapped about her shoulders.

"I am ready now," she said.

Seaforth glanced at her a moment with open admiration. The girl to
hide her weariness stood very straight, and Alice Deringham knew how to
hold herself. The pallor in her face intensified the little glow in
her eyes and the ruddy gleam of her lustrous hair under the lamplight.
She was, it seemed to him, almost splendid in her statuesque symmetry,
but there was also a subtle change in her, and a sudden sense of
confusion came upon him. He remembered his previous distrust of her,
and that it was to save his comrade she had come.

"No," he said quietly; "you must rest and sleep before you go to