" responded Thomas, looking boldly up into her pale face,
"I wager you a gold pound sterling that if you permit me to remain here by
your side ten minutes you will be unwilling--"

"John, John!" cried the girl, exultantly. Tom snatched the red beard from
his face, and Dorothy, after one fleeting, luminous look into his eyes,
fell upon her knees and buried her face in her hands. She wept, and John,
bending over the kneeling girl, kissed her sunlit hair.

"Cruel, cruel," sobbed Dorothy. Then she lifted her head and clasped her
hands about his neck. "Is it not strange," she continued, "that I should
have felt so sure of seeing you? My reason kept telling me that my hopes
were absurd, but a stronger feeling full of the breath of certainty seemed
to assure me that you would be here. It impelled me to come, though I
feared you after we crossed the wall. But reason, fear, and caution were
powerless to keep me away."

"You did not know my voice," said John, "nor did you penetrate my
disguise. You once said that you would recognize me though I wore all the
petticoats in Derbyshire."

"Please don't jest with me now," pleaded Dorothy. "I cannot bear it. Great
joy is harder to endure than great grief. Why did you not reveal yourself
to me at the Hall?" she asked plaintively.

"I found no opportunity," returned John, "others were always present."

I shall tell you nothing that followed. It is no affair of yours nor of
mine.

They were overjoyed in being together once more. Neither of them seemed to
realize that John, while living under Sir George's roof, was facing death
every moment. To Dorothy, the fact that John, who was heir to one of
England's noblest houses, was willing for her sake to become a servant, to
do a servant's work, and to receive the indignities constantly put upon a
servant, appealed most powerfully. It added to her feeling for him a
tenderness which is not necessarily a part of passionate love.

It is needless for me to tell you that while John performed faithfully the
duty of keeping bright the fires in Haddon Hall, he did not neglect the
other flame--the one in Dorothy's heart--for the sake of whose warmth he
had assumed the leathern garb of servitude and had placed his head in the
lion's mouth.

At first he and Dorothy used great caution in exchanging words and
glances, but familiarity with danger breeds contempt for it. So they
utilized every opportunity that niggard chance offered, and blinded by
t