I am only _dreading_ I may
have to suffer. He can never, by any possibility, see his wife again."

Poor Alice was sorely puzzled. She could only wonder what he was coming
to, and acquiesce.

"But was he really fond of her?"

"I cannot imagine, Captain Tournier, why you should ask such a question.
I am glad you did not ask _him_."

"Oh, but I have a reason for asking. Of your charity, bear with me a
little longer. But you say he really did love his wife passionately?"

"Beyond all doubt. His life was bound up in hers. When he lost her, he
lost his best. He tells me he will never marry again, and has asked me
to be his companion."

There was a tone of impatience in her voice, which Tournier, however,
noticed not, but passed from his former eagerness of manner into a sort
of dreamy abstraction, as if talking to himself.

"And yet the man seems happy--_is_ happy; goes about as cheerful as the
day; laughs and jokes, and enjoys his life. I cannot comprehend it!"

Alice was indeed in "Wonderland."

He seemed lost in thought.

At length he changed back to his eager manner again.

"And now, Miss Cosin, comes the question: I want you, of your great
kindness, to answer, and to lead up to which I have given you so much
trouble. Pardon, pardon an unhappy man. Tell me, what is the secret of
your brother's power to bear his trouble, and even triumph over it. I
want, _myself_, to learn it."

"I can only say," replied Alice, with all simplicity, but looking with
her clear blue eyes into his face, "I know God helped him, as no one else
could, and was very kind to him, as He is to all who want Him."

She was only just in time, for, as she finished, her brother came back
again.

Soon after they took leave of each other, and the captain returned to his
quarters. And as he went along this thought kept coming into his mind,
like the flash of a revolving light--"Cosin not only believes in God, but
has found Him a help in time of greatest trouble!"

CHAPTER IV.--MUTINY OF THE PRISONERS.

In the course of the following year, the prisoners of Norman Cross began
to show a spirit of general insubordination. There had been from time to
time individual cases of attempted outbreak, some few successful, but for
the most part ending in recapture. No one can wonder that, among so many
men, in the full vigour of life, there should be not a few who, sick at
heart of their rigorous captivity, one day succeeding anot