lentless chief had placed such shadow of evil report between his name
and the rewards due to his service, that even the promised recognition
of his brilliant actions at Zaraila and elsewhere was postponed a while
on the plea of investigation. He was thankful that the honors which
the whole Army expected for him, and which the antagonism of Chateauroy
would soon be powerless to avert any longer from their meet bestowal,
did not force him to go up there in the scorching light of the noon, and
take those honors as a soldier of France, under the eyes of the man he
loved, of the woman he adored.

As it was, he sat motionless as a statue in his saddle, and never looked
westward to where the tricolors of the flagstaff drooped above the head
of Venetia Corona.

Thus, he never heard the gallant words spoken in his behalf by the loyal
lips that he had not cared to caress. As she passed down the ranks,
indeed, he saw and smiled on his little champion; but the smile had only
a weary kindness of recognition in it and it wounded Cigarette more than
though he had struck her through the breast with his lance.

The moment that he had dreaded came; the troops broke up and marched
past the representative of their empire, the cavalry at the head of the
divisions. He passed among the rest; he raised his lance so that it hid
his features as much as its slender shaft could do; the fair and noble
face on which his glance flashed was very pale and very grave; the one
beside her was sunny and frank, and unchanged by the years that had
drifted by, and its azure eyes, so like her own, sweeping over the
masses with all the swift, keen appreciation of a military glance, were
so eagerly noting carriage, accouterment, harness, horses, that they
never once fell upon the single soldier whose heart so unutterably
longed for, even while it dreaded, his recognition.

Venetia gave a low, quick breath of mingled pain and relief as the last
of the Chasseurs passed by. The Seraph started, and turned his head.

"My darling! Are you not well?"

"Perfectly!"

"You do not look so; and you forgot now to point me out this special
trooper. I forgot him too."

"He goes there--the tenth from here."

Her brother looked; it was too late.

"He is taller than the others. That is all I can see now that his back
is turned. I will seek him out when--"

"Do no such thing!"

"And why? It was your own request that I inquired--"

"Think me changeable as you will.