ender and
thoughtful attention seemed to soften the field of battle, and
presently I found myself picking up the Colonel's sword and returning
it to him.

"Thank you," he said; "I can only carry it in my belt at present, but I
would not like to lose it, for it has proved you a better swordsman
than I had expected."

Handsomely said, was it not? But we are always inclined to think a
compliment to ourselves fitting, especially when it comes from an enemy
as formidable as Jock Farquharson was.

"I hope, sir," I answered without undue gravity, "that I have earned
the compliment and I accept it, as I accepted your challenge, without
reserve. Now, I suppose, our meeting is finished, and so we may each
go our own way. Mistress Forbes, will you allow me to see you home?"
and I turned towards her.

She took my arm and we walked quietly from Lonach Tower and quietly
across the hills to the Dower House, neither of us saying much on the
way, possibly because our thoughts were not for the six soldier men who
strode behind us.

_XIV--The Cards of Love_

A man who serves the cause of a good woman is serving well, her and
himself, even if he only waits in the garden of the emotions. He is
probably helping that woman in subtle, beautiful ways, to be herself,
to realize the full majesty of her womanhood, which otherwise she might
miss. I had the highest wish to help the interests of Marget, and if
my heart beat an accompaniment, that was only another test of my
sincerity.

There, perhaps, I have written as if I had grown sure of Marget, which
I had no right to be, which no man can ever be of any Marget, else
romance would perish. Typical of other youth and maid stories was
ours, a story without a beginning, a middle, or an apparent ending; a
sort of skein of hope and unspoken understanding such as links two
people, until they come closer or drift apart, ships that pass in the
night that should be the morning.

When did we begin to care for each other, if that state of regard as
between us was to be assumed, because people do ask themselves such
questions, and if they do, why not admit it? When does a flower begin
to bloom? Who can tell? You see it, one unheralded high-noon, as if
it were just ready to burst beautifully upon its world. So it is,
still much depends on how the world is going to treat it. The flower
blows, if sunshine greets and warms it. But let the sky be grey,
sombre, leaden, and that flower