rd-house; here and
there an illuminated window cast its oblong of paler light across
the grass. Southward the crimson radiance had died out; softened
echoes of distant gunshots marked the passing of the slow, dark
hours, but the fitful picket firing was now no louder than the
deadened stamp of horses in their stalls.

A faint scent of jasmine hung in the air, making it fresher, though
no breeze stirred.

He stood for a while, face upturned to the stars, then his head
fell. Sabre trailing, he moved slowly out into the open; and, at
random, wandered into the little lane that led darkly down under
green bushes to Letty's bridge.

It was fresher and cooler in the lane; starlight made the planking
of the little foot-bridge visible in the dark, but the stream ran
under it too noiselessly for him to hear the water moving over its
bed of velvet sand.

A startled whippoorwill flashed into shadowy night from the rail as
he laid his hand upon it, and, searching for the seat which Letty's
invalid had built for her, he sank down, burying his head in his
hands.

And, as he sat there, a vague shape, motionless in the starlight,
stirred, moved silently, detaching itself from the depthless wall
of shadow.

There was a light step on the grass, a faint sound from the bridge.
But he heard nothing until she sank down on the flooring at his
feet and dropped her head, face downward, on his knees.

As in a dream his hands fell from his eyes--fell on her shoulders,
lay heavily inert.

"Ailsa?"

Her feverish face quivered, hiding closer; one small hand searched
blindly for his arm, closed on his sleeve, and clung there. He
could feel her slender body tremble at intervals, under his lips,
resting on her hair, her breath grew warm with tears.

She lay there, minute after minute, her hand on his sleeve,
slipping, tightening, while her tired heart throbbed out its heavy
burden on his knees, and her tears fell under the stars.

Fatigued past all endurance, shaken, demoralised, everything in her
was giving way now. She only knew that he had come to her out of
the night's deathly desolation--that she had crept to him for
shelter, was clinging to him. Nothing else mattered in the world.
Her weary hands could touch him, hold fast to him who had been lost
and was found again; her tear-wet face rested against his; the
blessed surcease from fear was benumbing her, quieting her,
soothing, relaxing, reassuring her.

Only to rest this w