later the eldest son of
the Tarboe family had been found dead in the woods with a gun in his
hand and a bullet through his heart. No one had ever linked the death of
Denzil's loved one with that of Almeric Tarboe.

It was unusual for a Frenchman to give up his life to an English family,
but that is what he had done, and of late he had watched Junia with new
eager solicitude. The day she first saw Tarboe had marked an exciting
phase in her life.

Denzil had studied her, and he knew vaguely that a fresh interest,
disturbing, electrifying, had entered into her. Because it was Tarboe,
the fifteen years younger brother of that Almeric Tarboe who had died
a month after his own girl had left this world, his soul was
fighting--fighting.

As the smoke of Carnac's pipe came curling into the air, Denzil put on
his coat, and laid the hoe and rake on his shoulder.

"Yes, even when it's hard going we still have to march on--name of God,
yes!" he repeated, and he looked at Carnac quizzically.

"Where are you going? Don't you want to talk to me?"

"I'm going home, m'sieu'. If you'll come with me I'll give you a drink
of hard cider, the best was ever made."

"I'll come. Denzil, I've never been in your little house. That's
strange, when I've known you so many years."

"It's not too late to mend, m'sieu'. There ain't much in it, but it's
all I need."

Carnac stepped with Denzil towards the little house, just in front of
three pine-trees on the hill, and behind Junia's home.

"I always lock my door--always," said Denzil as he turned a key and
opened the door.

They entered into the cool shade of a living-room. There was little
furniture, yet against the wall was a kind of bunk, comfortable and
roomy, on which was stretched the skin of a brown bear. On the wall
above it was a crucifix, and on the opposite wall was the photograph of
a girl, good-looking, refined, with large, imaginative eyes, and a face
that might have been a fortune.

Carnac gazed at it for a moment, absorbed. "That was your girl, Denzil,
wasn't it?" he asked.

Denzil nodded. "The best the world ever had, m'sieu'," he replied, "the
very best, but she went queer and drowned herself--ah, but yes!"

"She just went queer, eh!" Carnac said, looking Denzil straight in the
eyes. "Was there insane blood in her family?"

"She wasn't insane," answered Denzil firmly. "She'd been bad
used--terrible."

"That didn't come out at the inquest, did it?"

"Not likely.