he sweetest of shots from the
saddle. But he who now rode there dared not pull a trigger, for it
might easily cost him his life, and that was a possession he did not
want to lose just then.

It was an exciting ride withal--keenly so; for every turn of the way
might bring him face to face with an enemy. If he topped a rise of the
ground, might he not run right into the teeth of a hostile band on the
other side? As he rode along the slope of a bush-clad hill, for he
avoided the bottom of defile or ravine, he more than half expected the
"whizz" of missiles from the ambushed savage lurking concealed above.
Yes, it was an exciting ride, a perilous ride, yet he travelled at an
easy pace, knowing better than to fall into the blunder of pressing his
steed in order that it might the more quickly be got over.

At first he enjoyed the exciting possibilities of the journey--the
strong dash of peril--as, keenly on the alert, he urged his steed
forward. It reminded him of old times. But each and every excitement
has its limits, and as the hours went by the tension relaxed, the strain
upon his nerves subsided. He began to think upon other matters than
potential danger. That last farewell under the stars--the recollection
of it coursed sweet and warm through his being; his pulses bounded with
the very gladsomeness of living. Soon they would meet again, and--what
a meeting!

For this voluntary absence of his had borne its fruit. But a few days;
yet it had seemed to need only this to consolidate and weld this
strange, bewildering love of his latter-day life. In the rough duties
he had voluntarily undertaken during that brief period--the patrolling,
the tireless bivouac under the stars; the shots exchanged with the
lurking enemy; the jovial, but not very boisterous revelry of camp
life--that image was ever-present, sweet, smiling, radiant-eyed; and try
as he might, he could not banish it.

Now the shadow of a cloud swept across his path, together with a gleam
of blue lightning. Creeping stealthily up, their jagged outlines
gradually obliterating the blue arch, leaden cloud-piles were spreading,
and puffs of hot wind set the grasses singing. In sharp, staccato boom,
the electric voice spoke overhead, but no rain fell. It was a dry
thunderstorm, often the most perilous.

He was riding just beneath the apex of a long, sparsely-bushed ridge.
Already, as he began to descend, the lightning was darting down upon the
height in