t
as if he had stretched out his hands to her across the great, dividing
gulf that had opened between them and drawn her to his side.

About a quarter of an hour later Eustace Tudor rose noiselessly and
stood looking down at his young wife's sleeping face. It was placid as
an infant's, and her breathing was soft and regular. He knew that,
undisturbed, she would sleep so for hours.

And so he did not dare to kiss her. He only bowed his head till his lips
touched the coverlet beneath which she lay; and then stealthily,
silently, he crept away.

CHAPTER X

A CHANGE OF PRISONERS

Heavens, how the night crawled! Phil Turner, bound hand and foot, and
cruelly cramped in every limb, hitched himself to a sitting posture and
began to calculate how long he probably had to live.

There was no moon, but the starlight entered his prison--it was no more
than a mud hut, but had it been built of stone walls many feet thick his
chance would scarcely have been lessened. It was merely a question of
time, he knew, and he marvelled that his fate had been delayed so long.

To use his comrade's descriptive language, he had expected "a knife and
good-bye" full twenty hours before. But neither had been his portion. He
had been made a prisoner before he was fully awake, and hustled away to
the native fort before sunrise. He had been given _chupatties_ to eat
and spring water to drink, and, though painfully stiff from his bonds,
he was unwounded.

It had been a daring capture, he reflected; but what were they keeping
him for? Not for the sake of hospitality--of that he was grimly
certain. There had been no pretence at any friendly feeling on the part
of his captors. They had glared hatred at him from the outset, and Phil
was firmly convinced, without any undue pessimism, that they had not the
smallest intention of sparing his life.

But why they postponed the final deed was a problem, that he found
himself quite unable to solve. It had worried him perpetually for twenty
hours, and, combined with the misery of his bonds, made sleep an
impossibility.

Sleep! The very thought of it was horrible to him. It had never struck
him before as a criminal waste of the precious hours of life, for Phil
was young, and he had not done with mortal existence. There were in it
deeps he had not sounded, heights he had never scaled. He was not
prepared to forego these at the will of a parcel of murderous ruffians
who chanced to object to the white