ked.

He waited for an instant, before he answered her question. Her next
words might contain all, or nothing. His lips shut to a narrow line;
then he straightened his shoulders.

"Ethel," he said rapidly; "I have been in a good many fights; I've
found that it hurts more to be mangled than it does to be killed.
Speak out, then, and end this thing once for all. Was it final, what
you said to the Captain, that day?"

She bit her lip; but her voice would not come, and she could only
give a little, dreary nod. Weldon watched her steadily for a moment;
then he turned to go away.

For another moment, Ethel stared after him, heedless now of the
drops that were sliding down her cheeks. Then, of a sudden, she
found her voice. "Wait!" she said, as she stepped forward with a
swift gesture which was wholly imploring, wholly feminine. "It may
have been final; but finality is not always truth."

He halted at her words.

"And you mean?"

"I mean," she answered him; "I mean that then, and now, and always,
I loved one man, and he--" she caught her breath; then she lifted
her head proudly; "was you. The rest was all a mistake; but I did
what I thought was best."

Weldon bowed his head.

"No matter now," he answered.

Then, taking her hand, he led her back to the open window where they
stood together long, while, in the room beyond, an anxious colonel
threaded his way to and fro in the crowd, impatiently hunting the
partner in whose memory he had ceased to exist.

End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of On the Firing Line, by
Anna Chapin Ray and Hamilton Brock Fuller

*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ON THE FIRING LINE ***

***** This file should be named 3605.txt or 3605.zip *****
This and all associated files of various formats will be found in:
http://www.gutenberg.org/3/6/0/3605/

Produced by Charles Franks and the Online Distributed
Proofreading Team. HTML version by Al Haines.

Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions
will be renamed.

Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no
one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation
(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without
permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules,
set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to
copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to
protect the PROJECT GU