e streets and cast out
into the lust of the sharks. Venetia hesitated a moment in astonished
wonder; then, with the grace and the courtesy of her race, rose and
approached the entrance of her tent, in which that fierce--half a
soldier, half a child--was standing, with the fitful, reddened light
behind. She recognized whose it was.

"Is it you, ma petite?" she said kindly. "Come within. Do not be
afraid----"

She spoke with the gentle consideration of a great lady to one whom she
admired for her heroism, compassionated for her position, and thought
naturally in need of such encouragement. She had liked the frank,
fearless, ardent brunette face of the Little Friend of the Flag; she had
liked her fiery and indomitable defense of the soldier of Zaraila;
she felt an interest in her as deep as her pity, and she was above the
scruples which many women of her rank might have had as to the fitness
of entering into conversation with this child of the army. She was
gentle to her as to a young bird, a young kitten, a young colt; what
her brother had said of the vivandiere's love for one whom the girl only
knew as a trooper of Chasseurs filled with an indefinable compassion the
woman who knew him as her own equal and of her own Order.

Cigarette, for once, answered nothing; her eyes very lowering, burning,
savage.

"You wish to see me?" Venetia asked once more. "Come nearer. Have no
fear--"

The one word unloosed the spell which had kept Cigarette speechless;
the one word was an insult beyond endurance, that lashed all the worst
spirit in her into flame.

"Fear!" she cried, with a camp oath, whose blasphemy was happily
unintelligible to her listener. "Fear! You think I fear you!--the
darling of the army, who saved the squadron at Zaraila, who has seen a
thousand days of bloodshed, who has killed as many men with her own
hand as any Lascar among them all--fear you, you hothouse flower, you
paradise-bird, you silver pheasant, who never did aught but spread your
dainty colors in the sun, and never earned so much as the right to eat a
pierce of black bread, if you had your deserts! Fear you--I! Why! do
you not know that I could kill you where you stand as easily as I could
wring the neck of any one of those gold-winged orioles that flew above
your head to-day, and who have more right to live than you, for they do
at least labor in their own fashion for their food, and their drink,
and their dwelling? Dieu de Dieu! Why, I have ki