, she did all for the best, and would have given the eyes out
of her head, I believe, to have done us real good, and seen us clear of
all our troubles.

Well, she brings a chair out on the verandah, and Sir Ferdinand he sat
down on a bench there for half-an-hour, talking away and laughing, just
as gentlemen will to pretty girls, no matter who they are. And I could
see Aileen look up and laugh now and then, pleased like. She couldn't
help it. And there was I stuck in the confounded barn among the straw
all the time looking out through one of the cracks and wondering if he
was ever going to clear out. Sometimes I thought the trooper, who was
getting tired of dodging about doing nothing, couldn't be off seeing my
horse's tracks leading slap into the barn door. But he was thinking of
something else, or else wasn't much in the tracking line. Some men would
see a whole army of fresh tracks, as plain as print, right under their
noses and wouldn't drop down to anything.

However, last of all I saw him unhitch his horse and take the bridle on
his arm, and then Aileen put on her hat and walked up to the top of the
ridge along the stony track with him. Then I saw him mount and start
off at a rattling good bat along the road to Turon and the trooper after
him. I felt all right again then, and watched Aileen come slowly down
the road again with her head down, quite thoughtful like, very different
from the way she went up. She didn't stop at the house, but walked
straight down to the barn and came in at the door. I wondered what she
would do when she saw my horse. But she didn't start, only said--

'You may come out now, Dick; I knew you were here. I saw you ride in
just as Sir Ferdinand and the trooper came up.'

'So that's why you were making yourself so pleasant,' says I laughingly.
'I mustn't tell Starlight, I suppose, or we shall be having a new yarn
in the newspapers--"Duel between Sir Ferdinand Morringer and Captain
Starlight."'

She laughed too, and then looked sad and serious like again.

'I wonder if we shall ever have an end to this wretched hide-and-seek
work. God knows I would do anything that an honest girl could do for you
boys and him, but it sometimes looks dark enough, and I have dreadful
fears that all will be in vain, and that we are fated to death and ruin
at the end.'

'Come, come, don't break down before the time,' I said. 'It's been a
close shave, though; but Sir Ferdinand won't be back for a bit, so we