Yet now, now that the hidden thing in his life
had been revealed to her, she found herself shrinking from it in utter
loathing! Her promises of faith and loyalty were already crumbling under
the strain of her knowledge of the truth.

She flinched from the recognition of the fact, seeking miserably
to palliate and excuse it. When she had given Garth that impetuous
assurance of her confidence, she had not, in her crudest imaginings,
dreamed of anything so hideous and ignoble as the actual truth had
proved to be. Vaguely, she had deemed him outcast for some big, reckless
sin that by the splendour of its recklessness almost earned its own
forgiveness.

And instead--_this_! This drab-hued, pitiful weakness for which she
could find no pardon in her heart.

Through the turmoil of her thoughts she became conscious that Elisabeth
was stooping over her, answering her wild incredulous questioning.

"Yes, it is true," she was saying steadily. "He was court-martialled and
cashiered. But, if you still doubt it, ask him yourself, Sara."

Sara's hands clenched themselves. Her eyes were feverishly brilliant in
her white, shrunken face.

"Yes, I'll ask him myself." She panted a little. "You must be
wrong--there must be some horrible mistake somewhere. I've been mad--mad
to believe it for a single moment." She slipped from the bed to her
feet, and stood confronting Elisabeth with a kind of desperate defiance.
"Do you hear what I say?" she said loudly. "I don't believe it. I will
never believe it till Garth himself tells me that it is true."

"Oh, my dear"--Elisabeth shrank away a little, but her eyes were kind
and infinitely pitying. Sara felt frightened of the pitying kindness in
those eyes--its rejection of Garth's innocence was so much stronger than
any asseveration of mere words. Vaguely she heard Elisabeth's patient
voice: "I think you are right. Ask him yourself--but, Sara, he will not
be able to deny it."

CHAPTER XXVIII

RED RUIN

"You sent for me, and I am here."

The brusque, curt speech sounded a knell to the faint hope which Sara
had been tending whilst she waited for Garth's coming. His voice, the
dogged expression of his face, the chill, brief manner, each held its
grievous message for the woman who had learned to recognize the signs of
mental stress in the man she loved.

"Yes, I sent for you," she said. "I--I--Garth, I have seen Elisabeth."

"Yes?" Just the one brief monosyllable in response, uttered w