THE LIGHT IN HER EYES.

Oamaru Mail, Volume XXXIX, Issue 10783, 3 June 1911, Page 1 (Supplement)

THE LIGHT IN HER EYES.

(By Marguorita Spalding Gerry.)

At-three every afternoon. Smith made his way to hi.s Lieutenant's steamer chair, in a sheltered nook under the pilot- house on tlie starboard >ide. carrying' rugs and cushions. In perhaps ten minutes he appeared again, almost carrying the Lieutenant himself. The Lieutenant was very tail where Smith was short, so the arm that Smith had passed around his own neck remained ■there without much difficulty; and. thus supported, the empty sleeve secured by being thrust into a pocket, and with the serceani's own arm around the drooping body, the journey from stateroom to deck could be performed without much difficulty. Smith had seen to -it that the most desirable spot on the forward deck was reserved for his charge; it was pleasantly in the sun, and yet shielded from the north-west wind that was beginning to have a bite iu it. In fact-, it was a spot that the deck steward reserved usually only where the tip was of princely magnitude, yet Smith, who had been put in charge of Harthen's slender resources, had no argument but a hastily uttered story poured into a usually impassive ear. Those passengers o£ the Yokohama that happened to be in the vicinity were apt to turn their heads away when the pair appeared. Harthcn was too uncomfortably like a corpse to have the spectacle one upon which their eyes cared to rest. And when the fussy, anxious little attendant had cautiously lowered his charge into the depths of the chair, swathed him with so many rugs that it was only by inference that one could imagine a man was at the centre of them, and sat down on the camp stool at his side; the emaciated race, with the thick skin lying iu loose, yellowed folds over the large uatures, was still without expression. i>ne could only conjerture whether the iL-iiessness of the hollow eyes was due to weakness or despair. Curious passengers paused to ask the attendant about his story, sympathetic miiils sought for news of his condition. ! he questions were answered or evaded, .iccording to Smith's intuition as to the motive of the enquirer. On the fourth morning out, Miss Halstead, with a motion of her definite little right hand which signified that the companions of her promenade should on without her —thera was one new one that afternoon—stopped before the pair. _

"Why do you always hold his hand in yoursshe inquired, without prelude. Directness was characteristic of

h- r. I'nderneatli the tender appeal of ihe glance of eye and quality of voice, was the quiet assurance that people would do as she suggested. Smith struggled to his feet, still holding the limp hand in his. "Why. it's this way, ma'am,"' he n>wered with the deference that he rarely accorded to uninilitary inter-lui-utors. "The Lootenant's been all ■-h.it up. And,his nerves is all to the h id —it's a nervous breakdown, the doctor says," with a sudden assumption of medical phraseology. "Though it's insultin', it seems to me, to talk .about his bavin' nerves!"

"Tell me all about- it. No, no, pleaso .-it. I understand, you can't move. 1 would rather stand." Sho was facing thern as she ieaucd against the railing. "Doesn't he hear:*" This query was made with her eyes, but was so definite that Smith answered it aloud.

"No, indeed, ma'am." It was queer that the man instinctively called her "ma'am" when he was convinced that

she was not only unmarried, but very young. "He's been that way for weeks, hie either doesn't hear at all, or he's jo uumblike that he doesn't care. It would be good for him, I figure it out, it something he heard would start him up a bit. It ain't natural to be like he is."

The wind had loosened a corner of the big-plaided rug whose reds and greens made more ghastly the ghastly face. A shudder passed pver the girl as the long J.iukness of the sleeve was laid bare, empty from the shoulder; and then tears made her eyes more tender. But the sergeant leaned forward to tuck in, irith his disengaged right hand, the rug around the bony shoulders. His touch was as tender and fussy as that of an inexperienced little mother with a month-old baby. But a glance from Miss Halstead's eyes brought him back to the Lieutenant's bony fingers, clasped ti.'ht in his own. hard hand.

" Would you mind—if it isn't too rr.'ich trouble —?" Smith straightened hi.s shoulders and was twice the man he v.before he heard the gentle courtesy o; her voice. "I would so love to hear whole story, from the very beginning. you know —every word!" "Indeed, I'd be proud to tell you, Eii'am." Miss Halstead could not know that halt" the passenger-list of the Yokohama had made the request she had to be refused in gruff discour-

We was part of the Allies about Tieu-Tsin. aud things was goin' bad. There was the old city, and the walls ~er.t around it in a sort" of a- square. Ai:! the Chinamen was pouring shot n.: .-hell down into us from the walls hard as they could drive. Outside walls was "a rotten moat, full ot Chinamen, some uf 'em dead for a week. i>;c>ide rhat was a swamp and next t«> -i t a tielil. The field was where the t;-1 • ral-iu-ehief, an Englishman, was dir.iau thing* and where the reserves.

I wasn't in the Lootenant's coiniui v a t first —he was actin' Captain • rily lie hadn't- been made that .vet • iai. Mine was the Fourth. He had /i.-t reported from taking a wounded ii [i ro the rear under heavy fire, and - : ititeerrd for service and got it. Then he came out where I was—l h-ln't heen in action—there am t no rea.-ori for to tell you why." His laco dnrklv red and ho turned lus eyes v v mini her. "1 was fcelin' sore. And" the Lootenant knew it by lookin It lie SO he said: 'You don't give a r - vou -' And I said I didn t. Tr: ii he'laughed, a big, happy sort of ii ■ . 'jti. He was about the huskiest i r 1 ever see, ma'am; not much or ran n to make a show around where Li i. - was. but a jim-dandy to make r.>n ollow after him. 'Then you come a! with me; we don't want any hu s that have got wives and babies :■> _ home to,' he went on. 'For it s i £ iob we're going m for. But " fools like us don't get up near ■ • .jh to shoot the grin out of their faces —well, there arc women and ! r It within the walls! And there s "> e in the despatches for every one

.-. that falls'.' . . k was a tough enough proposition : r the men across the field, ror . ■ rt of thing ain't got the hurtrumpeting and dash 01 a -charge, it's just pushing your • n hit by bit wlicro it's mighty baa I. and seein', on an average or minute, some man crumple up : n down. But when we got into - -ir- I '. it got- harder still. The ■ r did his best, but we was only and sixty to start with, and ■ was only about eighty. So soon the men stopped altogether. ' couldn't get 'en* on. He had - arm brandishin' around in tno ■ -.-.av vou can't help doin when i ursiii' 'em and beggin em by : and kickin'. too, and threat- : , shoot, when a lump of sharp- ' r i - along and glanced off From a ill tore his arm all to P' c , cc , s * ' crumpled up, too, and slid to

-""iind. . , -„i V n I got to him he was d > , " 1 bccauw an artery ha I •r that had made 3 good-size pud- • M. 'ul op. the ground. But when r,i a little he knew, of cours<% • u r:i!<ltr t get up under the walls i- ■ • f >• made us. so he gavo up feoliti .'ii tiir- ground am: got me to ■ i *t to screw the thing up sou:er.| ph..r the hole with first-aid He got to his with _ h;md stuck into n pocket beit in the way. And. well. ln> : " : 11r, f liere somehow. I don't kno.r ~ r- the lord or the d"vil helped - • !(> it. Bnt sixty of us—with ;hphd looking liko notliin rh-it I ever see and yelling like ' mm— got through the stinkin* ■" - r that there moat and hung on nn<! held the fire so the other • [ , r rt!f| -et their breath and forget thev wanted to run. It seemed flint it was the next minute that piled into it and there was a r ; i with some more scrappin* "v:rs,i. but it's different when it's r " '"r side. And then it was over and ,r ' _""'t f't. • 'i,i no iv it's a gamble whether he r- r not. The doctors sav he's ir i li-ir 1 think something's broken i r,i his head or nerves or somed he don't particular want to And I can't make him, nohow.

Ho don't give .1 d-dime oven when I read him tin- despatchrs and lio sees that lie's been posted hy tin' Khglsih general for conspicuous gallantry and for the Y.C. —which of h-> can i gc-t. not- being ail Eng-h.-hman. but is the nearest they could coii!'. v to giving it to him—and decorated hy the .Japanese. His captain's commission is waiting for him. Ho's got the whole Service in his pocket! Ami he won't even take an egg-and-;herrv unless I choke him so lie lias !to swallow it ! And then he'd fight me if he wasn't so weak!" The little man's .voice had grown husky and he bent his head as he tucked the ru<r over the feet of the inert figure to hide the blurring of his I eyesight. "When his hand was loosened and the invalid missed the firm, warm, human clasp, his body began to shake wth pitiful tremors, and dismay and terr.n came into the pale eyes. Miss Halstead had been following the sergeant's story with a face that alternately paled and flushed and with lips that often trembled. With her eyes hidden she said to Smith . "You have to hold his hand like that—all the time? Or ho shakes and

tremoies so? But that keeps you bv him! That is hard on you —confining." The sergeant cleared his throat, and ?poko with embarrassed gruffness: "That ain't nothin', ma'am, to what I'd like to do. The moro you git a chance to do the moro dog-goned proud you are when it's a man —like—him." "Do you suppose—" The girl turned on him with the impersonal directness that gave such a curious accession of dignity to hr-r slight and charming presence. "Would it moke any difference to him if it was the hand of anyone else—me hand?"

Sara had never received a greater tribute than the fact that the battered personality that confronted her saw nothing either belittling or humorous in her suggestion: "We might try it, ma'am, and see." Cautiously a hand, soft yet vigorous, slid its smooth beauty into the long bony fingers as the sergeant drew hi.s iiaud away. The sergeant straightened himself and stretched his cramped arms luxuriously. Miss Halstead nodded to

him \t;ith authority: "Or) and get- some rest," she said, under her-breath, bui with the finality that marked her. "I'll stay here for two hours." It is doubtful if the Yokohama in the length of her sea-going career had over had tli<- s'.'iisation that was fun ished it thai- day. When the tidings reached the aunt, the fiction of whoso authority was one of Miss Halstead's most valued possessions since it enabled her to have her own way very nearly to the top of her bent, that lady swallowed hard in anticipation of her certain defeat and '.ore down upon the spot <lll the forward deck, under the pilot-house, on the starboard side.

Miss Halstead. who understood perfectly that none of the excellent reasons

:.he might bring forward to explnin her net ion would be comprehended by her relative, confined herself in the short conversation, where neither voice rose above a beautifully enunciated murmur, to a gentle statement of her intentions in the matter. Gradually the nave of amusement, the undercurrent of ridicule, subsided around the invulnerable voting figure, and she was tacitly allowed to fill her place at the side of the piteous wreck with 110 comment.

For days Harthen was apparently oblivious. At- first he was actually so, too 7iear to the death he had evaded and too indifferent to the life he"might have to take up again, to bo conscious that it- was not Smith's hand that closed around his own. But there came a day when something that- was not an idea 1 and not altogether a sensation penetrated to the sullen recesses where the bewildered soul of him had taken refuge, and he turned his eyes and looked. Out of a vaguely inimical space, peopled hitherto with discordant sounds and distasteful images, two eyes, -made tender by thick lashes of velvet blackness, regarded him. From that day, although motion was to him a thing to be dreaded and speech a phenomenon almost impossible to compass. although he might lie for hours in an anathy that- was apparently never to be lifted, yet in some vague, thrilling way he felt. Thev hart been at sea two weeks before there was any evidence in the invalid's manner that- her presence meant anything to him. It was when she was ten minutes late ono afternoon. Smith had observed it, for he had made a mental note that the beer would be going stale, when his attention was drawn to his patient's unusual restlessness. From one side to the other Harthen turned his heavy head, his eyes brightened by unmistakable irritable inquiry. and the rugs displaced by his peevish motions. At that moment Miss Halstead came into sight. And iuto the Lieutenant's hollow eyes there came unmistakable satisfaction. Smith saw it. and from that- day dated the military salute with which lie invariably greeted the lady. It was the one mark of deference he knew concerning whose irood form ho could have no doubt. Miss Halstead realised her promotion, and marked it with a quiet little side smile, full of indulgent humor. But the stirring of the lapsed personality of .the man brought- to the surface a sediment of sullen despair. He had lifted his whole body eagerly. But the motion hurt the still sore wound. And that broucht back, what lv- had for the thousandth time forgotten. that- inconceivable outrage, the loss of his arm. The blood for an instant rushed to his anguished, humiliated face and then ebbed away. His eves turned: to the side of the ship, sought the water. There was sinister calculation in their hopeless depths. Being a woman who was all a-tinglo with delicate perceptions of the very thoughts of others, Miss Halstead understood. . "He is thinking he might as well drop overboard," she said to herself, in painful sympathy, as the poor eyes sought hers in hunted uncertainty as to how much she had divined. "W hat can I do that will make him want to live She would not act hastily. She knew that the man's tragedy was a desperate """And I'm sure he's so worth-while!" she sighed to herself. . But through the two hours quietude she sat with her mind at work. "If lie were once convinced that he could make up for it somehow —slic roused. When Smith came back she sat with her eves still on the endless procession of the waves, and on her face the deep, in-drawn look. From that time Sara went about with a purpose. . TT , She began by appearing at Harthen s side with a bundle of letters, steamer letters she remarked to the departing Smith, which she had not yet had time to road, and wliicli slie would look as she sat there. When Harthen and she were alone together she glanced through one or two and began making a comment or so aloud. Talking had never been a part of the programme j but now. in spite of persistent silence, she chose to consider that the invalid could listen. Over one of the letters she dehberateIv halted.

"Pluckv fellow!" she exclaimed emphatically. "Well, that is just about the bravest mail I know! Any other man would have thought his life was over." She almost laughed out with satisfaction, for the fingers that she held contracted. So she went on: '"lt's one of my friends who has had a knockdown blow. Tuberculosis, you know. He couldn't live East. And he had just worked up a splendid law practioe. He had to lose all his equipment—half his life thrown away —" She paused a moment, artistically, and then fluttered leaves and spoke with an absent- voice: "Amy one might be excused for being hitter. But he tells me lie is Retting interested in the conditions on the Indian reservations—there in dry countries where ho can live, you know. Here — yes, this is what he says: 'a practically "unlimited field—it's the type of character. Thev are such splendid men.' Good gracious, lie got a bear! But there. I musn't tire you." She lapsed I into silence, noting, from the corner other eye, that there was an unmistakable I flicker of interest in the dull eyes. The next day it was the career of Xelson that she had been reading about, and the keenness of his observation in spite of his one eye: on another day she was glowing over thfe intrepid old English admiral wjth his wooden leg. Prodding, suggesting, inspiring, never expecting any response, bat keeping up her comment as though monologue were her accustomed field, wanting'no sign but the involuntary motions that she

'.vas keen enough to interpret, bringing the whole genius of her subtle and tender to bear upon her selfimposed task of saving from wreck the life that chance had thrown in her way, as absorbed in the inornentarv interest as if she had elected it to be her life pursuit, quite as enthusiastically as though her way had not been illuminated with like fervors and as though many more did not await her in the environment to which she was returning—in this manner did Miss Halstead work for the remaining week of their passage.

From Harthen, though from day to day even the most indifferent could see improvement—Smith recorded with something very like tears of joy in his little reddened blue eyes that the Lieutenant was so much better that he swore when the sergeant was clumsy in getting him on deck—there was never a word. - Whether he was conscious of her effort, whether he was bored by it or simply enduring, often whether he was awake even, there was nothing to tell her. Until it came to the last day.

They were all out on deck, watching the indistinct hue of California coast form itself into the beautiful crescent harbor. Miss Halstead, in the midst of the general confusion and excitement, chose to stand near Harthen, not speaking but conveying to bim in this moment that must he fraught for him witli almost unbearable feeling—she had "discovered from Smith that a mother was awaiting him—the assurance of her own understanding thought. As she turned away to answer some query of her aunt, she thought tliat her skirt caught, and bent over to detach it. But it was Harthen's hand-. He was looking strongly up at her, and his grey eyes were keen and bright.

"I am going to live," he said. "I want you to know it."

M iss Halstead came into her drawingroom with the slightest frown of impatience upon her face. Kerby had forgotten the sponge cakes and the lerfion for tea again and Captain Harthen had written that he would be there at five. Sara was impatient of forms in most things. But it was a truism that certain things had to be, and she had very little patience with people that did not do their work. Now she rang for Kerby, brought him to a sense of his shortcomings in a very few words, and sent him away with the distinct- impression that, if it happened again, he would lose a very good situation. Then she dismissed the tiresome detail from her consciousness and wondered how Captain Harthen would look after the intervening months. She had supposed that the landing at San Francisco meant the end of the incident that had formed the central point of the voyage. With the impersonality that- was so_ curious a contrast to the impassioned interest with which she threw herself into the pursuit of her ideas, she had not the slightest emotion | over the fact that, having drawn the man back into a wholesome attitude towards his life, she would probably never see liim again. While Harthen as an invalid might make overwhelming appeal to the exquisite tenderness that awoke in her at the sight of suffering, she realised perfectly that Harthen, a normal human being, would probably prove rather tiresome than otherwise. -IJven if he did not develop the sentimental proclivities that on© or two of the musicians or painters around whose neglected merit she had rallied friends and relatives in times past had done, it was a stupid situation, and she had never understood why he had thought it necessary to send her. from time to time, his condition and plans. Worse than anything else, he might consider himself under obligation to her, which was a situation that effectually prevented any intelligent and sensible interchange of ideas. That afternoon Sara did not look altogether the person with whom any normally-constituted male being could placidly interchange impersonal theories.

A heavier dash of rain against the glass sent her to the window with a misgiving concerning the effect upon an invalid of the driving rain. Then she caught herself. Of conrse. Captain Harthen was probably perfectly well at this time—in fact, his letter had said he was. She was turning from the spectacle of the moving stream of bobbing, glistening umbrellas when a tall figure came into sight; it was swinging along at a great pace, with an easy, vigorous stride that filled her with quick approval of the- power it revealed. The man carried no umbrella. His grey felt army hat shed the rain in streams, and the rubber cape that he wore was sleek with wet. And, as he drew nearer, Miss Halstead saw that his strong, high military boots looked impervious to all but the Deluge. As the man climbed her awn steps she turned from the window with a sudden realisation that it wa.v

Harthen himself. She was still conscious of a most unusual sense of embarrassment when Kerby announced him. It was not within her reckoning that the man should i carry with him quite the sense of domi- ■ nance that that splendidly picturesque ; figure had revealed. The soft chimes | of a clock in the next room sounded , five times as Harthen, having wriggled • his glove off agaftist his thigh after ■ an expert fashion, handed it- to the waiting servant, advanced into the centre of the room, and stood gravely in the frivolous candle-light awaiting her . greeting. Me had' chosen to wear the khaki i which she had Ijeen used to think made more death-like the face of the invalid the summer before. But now it covered tlie deep chest, the magniScently straight and broad shoulders, the ; slender waist and powerful limbs of a man who stood facing lier in the full, almost insolent splendor of manhood. Although she would not let her eyes actually seek it, she felt that even the empty sleeve was worn like a hadge of honor, flaunted' with almost defiant braverv, a pennant to ward ofE pity. So splendidly set up he was, so hard of muscle, without an ounce of flesh that he could do without, so evidently was the will the master, that she caught her breath almost with terror, as if before an uncannily effective, soulless, ruthless machine of steel and. electricty. She raised her eyes to his face. It was all brown and gray; his skin was as dark almost as the khaki against it, his hair was a lighter brown, and his gray eyes direct and looked into hers with cool power. She had not guessed, in all the that she had sat beside him on the Yokohama, how fine were the lines of his features, how much capacity for thought lay in the broad foreheacl, how firmly the lips were set, and how grim was the prominence of the chin. His eyes held her, and she felt flutteringly dominated, anxious to conciliate. She was at once irritated with herself and on the defensive; the sensation was a fiew one. So, after the first greeting, she spoke with the delicate, incisive coolness .of which she was capable, instead of the warmth of welcome that , the circumstances would have naturally demanded. "You are on your way to Washington, you said?" "To take instructions from the State Department —they're giving me a special detail to make some observations. He spoke with crisp, impersonal decisiveness. "But before I sail—l go by way of Russia —I had to see you "What was the obligation?" Something within her was pitting against him, even while she was inwardly scolding herself for rudeness to the guest whi« certainly demanded consideration at her -hands. But he accepted her challenge with seriousness: . "I considered it an obligation. 1 told vou I was going to live. I had made up niv mind to drop off the side before we landed. I was just waiting until; I could walk the distance from the chair. Vou were the first person that- mado me think living was worth the effort— Good Lord, it. wasn't that there weren t enough people after one in Nagasaki," what with volunteer nurses smoothing vour forehead when all you wanted was to he allowed to go to sleep, and girls laving flowers on your pillow and all that rot. But not a soul of them all had the sense to know that what a fellow wants in a case like that isn t svmpathv, but assurance that-there is a way to lite —that he can still be on his job". Why, even General Hamlin went out of the room with the tears streaming down his face, and a dandy old scrapper like him ought to have known better than that. But you knew, and you told me just- what I wanted to know. So, of course, I had to come here, as soon as I had had a chance to get myself into condition, so you could see whether you thought I had . made good so far. l owed that to you

The impression that his manner conveyed was that this was a piece of almost professional duty, that he was reporting to a superior officer. Sara fell into the mood ; she regarded him with a face as serious as his own: "How did you do it?" she said. "It's like a miracle." Then she made an effort to bring the situation-into the normal. She seated herself and lighted the lamp under the kettle. "But I'm sure you must want some tea." He disregarded the interruption although he took the easy-chair opposite to her. But he answered the question i she had asked.

"I went into traiuing as soon as I was strong enough to walk." It was odd bow the detached definiteness of bis tone had the force to Sara of the most impassioned utterance she had ever heard. Perhaps it was that her quick imagination constructed for her the determination not to bo conquered that lay behind it. "There was an exbruiser at homo that had some good ideas," lie went on, "and we worked out som© exercises that served. The worst of ft was the fat." There was the nearest to a show of emotion that the interview had brought forth—the emphasis on the word "fat" was indescribable in its abhorrence. ."As soon as I.began to gain, everything went to flesh—all the food they give to invalids do that. So 1 had to work and diet, too, to get that off and get muscio up again.'.' He paused a moment, and the muscles of his face tightened:

"Ibo doctors had told mo that the shoulder where they had taken off the arm would certainly be higher, than the other, and that tho lung would be partially atrophied—always was in such cases. I told them —with elaborations —that they' didn't know what they were talking about, that I didn't propose to carry around anything lik<i that." Hero he stood, his lean figure very tense and straight. "AVoulri you mind coming here a minute. Miss Halstead?" be asked. "And put your hand here?" •

■ >Sho obeyed liis gesture and spread her fingers over his* chest, while he inflated the lungs underneath. -''And here," he commanded, "on m.v back!" Ai;am she obeyed, and folt the great bands knot and unknot under her hand, as lie flexed the muscles as seriously as though promotion in his profession depended on his establishing his fitness before this judge. "Do you see any signs of atrophy there?" lie challenged hor. "And is there any difference in the line of this shoulder?" She shook her head in evidence of the verdict, and sank into her chair again, oddly disconcerted. "I strike you as being a whole man, not a makeshift?" he asked, his searching eyes 011 hers. "Ready to do a m n's work?" '

She nodded again, afraid to - trust hor voice.

_ "Then that's done." He heaved a big sigh, and sat looking into the firelight with a certain restfulness in his face. Ho turned suddenly on her again. "And. of course you did it, you know that?"

She began to disclaim, but he cut her protestations short. "Oh, yes, you did it," he ended the matter. Sho found it comfortable to create a diversion and made a cup of tea, which he accepted perfunctorily. She couldn't help seeing how cleverly he managed, using the wide arm of his chair as a table, and adjusting his plate and cake and cup and saucer so well that no one would have realised that he was making one hand do the work of two. She thought how much perseverance, how much effort that skill in itself betrayed, and her throat contracted, but more in admiration than in pitv.

"Yes, it took a good long time to learn." ho said prosily, answering the thought behind her eyes. "But it is cutting up meat and putting on gloves that is really hard." "And what is to be now?" she asked.

"I think my work is going to be in China," he said. "I doubt if I. como back here, for more than a visit. The Chinese fighting man is a pretty fine being: he doesn't care what happens to him. Yon get to respect men that even with your superior training you have had to put up a good hard fight to heat. Things arc going to he liapoening. And I'd like to have a hand in making an army. I tell you, there's great stuff there!" The firelight caught his' eyes and, for the first time, she saw the gleam in them of exaltation ; he was on fire with enthusiasm. It made her feel a sudden chill of loneliness, this purpose in which neither she nor any woman could have a part.

"Tell tne," she said, leaning forward. "Is this the only thing you have brought out of all that horror—the desire to go back? What has it meant to you. after all, all that experience ?" Ho studied her before he decided to answer.

"I can't go into all the psychological part of it. For one thing, I never was much for going down inside myself to drag up motives and all that. And for another thing, there isn't any reason at all for all the fuss people make about fighting. There is nothing in it but going crazy mad, determined to got your men where you're told to go—and then, if you're hit, a long big grind afterward when the only thing you feel like doing is to swear at the whole thing. And there's no use going into the being sick part of it. for a field hospital is no place to take a woman, even in thought. But when you had been detailed to bury the dead in trenches before you were hit, and then when your cot is right where you can look, in the intervals when the surgeons are not torturing you, into the room where they arc cutting other men np and every other minute you see a leg or an arm come shooting through the air to add to the pile in the corner, you lose something in you that has made you regard individual human suffering or death as of great importance in comparison with great projects. And in place of that tenderness you are made, if there's any stuff in you 'to make it out of, a man. Beyond that "

"Beyond tliat?" she asked, a little breathlessly. "Well," he said, with perfectly sincere grimness. "a brute of an army nurse pounded me a liiJtle and flung me l down on my unhealed wound because I iothered him. I have learned that it does not pay ever to be the under dog!" He rose, and she knew that the que.er interview which had carried her through more untried emotions iilian any other talk of her life, was almost at an end. A craving for something to make him stay, disappointment that they should end with sucli a brutal I touch, a clutching after further revelation, possessed her. The talk —like the man -himself — seemed so incomplete, so garbled. "But Smith," she said desperately. "Smith's devotion was, at least-, as real as the brutality of the army nurse that struck you. Why don't you put the emphasis there? What have you done with him?" ... "Smith died Inst month," he said' casuallv. "The D.T.'s got. him. I 1 tried to hold him out of the gutter — •it was a great thing for him to have me to putter over. But as soon as I got well, he had lost his occupation, and there was no holding him in— —" The girl felt indignation at the indifference of his tone. "How can you speak so!" she said. "The man loved you!" Harthen dismissed the matter. "I staid by him and tried to help. I owed him that. But when the whisky has them .nothing will do them any good but a fight. Wrecks like that are ordained fighting men. But there isn t any war now, so Smith, went down before his appetites instead of before the cuns where he might have done more good! I toll you, Miss Halstead, there isn't anv other thing in the world that brings out all tlio hi-; liardv virtues but war!" He turned to go. "With her hand on the bell, she know that she must keep liim A tumult of something had arisen that told her—chokingly—that there was something more that must come. It was only an instant, but it seemed to her an eternity, that Harthen regarded her, with his exasperating air of duty done, his cool impersonal grey eyes oil hers. "He shall not go," she thought desperately. And before she could have time for another thought, or knew what she was doing, she had raised her oyes and given him—what she had never done deliberately to any mail before—a long, deep, challenging glance nutof the depths of her woman's beina. Harthen stood still. It seemed to her that he had given a start. Her hand fell away from the bell. lea vine a half-choked tinkle. He narrowed his

I eyes, a sudden mood that shot into them that made them almost black. Then he opened them wide, and they blazed on her. "Good Lord!" he said in a voice of hushed, significant wonder. "What a beautiful woman you are!" She had no time to realise the utter brutalhonesty of his surprise. She had clutched at her heart for awe. It was coming—:the something wonderful, terrifying, before which she shook with longing and shuddered-with fear. Kerby appeared. TVith all her training she couldn't say a word. It was Harthen who took command of her house and her, with a direct and complete sense of possession that left her no recourse but to defend herself with silence that should hide the trembling. He came j toward her. "Send your man away," he commanded her in a low voice. She nodded to Kerby, who slipped out noiselessly, wondering, for all his stiff impassive face. Harthen went on: "I have more to say to you." And again she nodded, unable to speak. "I think you know there was nothing of—this—" He spoke with entire re-

liance that she understood— "when 1 came to find you. It felt merely that I had to let you see whether I was worth saving. I owed you that. I've never thought much about women, just the puppy idiocies, and —the usual sort of thing. Rum or women, one or both, have done for most of the men 'I know who-have gone under. And I've Usually cut them both out. I hadn't a thought of you that way—until a minute ago, and then I knew. I'm going out to an uncertain sort of life. The woman I take out with me may find herself a widow. I'm being sent in all sorts of outlying provinces where they hate anything foreign—don't know there's a Government at Pekin and; never heard of the United States, and a man has to rely on his wits. Your life may depend on a phrase, and rii.y Chinese isn't much yet. And at the best, it's a rough life, I suppose, after this —" He gave a careless gesture that included all the beautiful firelit room, candle-luminous, and! filled with spoils from Sara's whole art-filled life.

For Sara, orphaned at sixteen, and mistress of her fortune at twenty, hadi been allowedto follow out most of the extravagant impulses of her ardent nag ture. Luckily these were usually Jprothe s and for all beautiful ideas. But the -uan before her never Those things—and what they implied l —' would have no power to attract him ; existing, he could see in them no impediment that could- come between. It was herself he wanted., this woman that had suddenly bloomed for him out of grey indifference, the woman supremely desirable, and therefore to be possessed. "I've never thought particularly about marrying—there has been too much to do. But I want you to be my wife. I can give you, at least, a name that's worth something where people know my record,- and a life that will have some interest, I should think, for a woman like you—" He questioned her a minute, and when the fire bad leaped into her eyes that had made them as martial as his own, he went on. "And—what is your name?" —she gave it to him with stiff lips—"Sara— I know you care—l saw it —I want you. Will you come?" Her eyes were on him. She could not tear them away. He stood before her, a splendid figure, a being of steel and compact energy; magnificently poised and compellingly male. Nothing before had ever dominated her. But this drew, pulled, commanded. She felt herself rising to meet it—she was • against his breast——. For an instant she was happy, completely thrilled to the depths of her • being. Then she raised her face and scanned him, with a sort of slow wonder that this man claimed her, come out of space, unknown the moment before. His face had reddened, his arm tightened around her, she was almost breathless, it hurt her. The eyes that fed on her were rapacious, the feeling that had drawn his face out of its control made her almost shudder. The passion in it was more cruel than the cold.

With such wonder the fairy castle, of her dreaming crashed around her. She forced herself back, loosened 1 his grasp, was out of his embrace. His surprise made him yield, half-realising. "What's the matter, what has happened?" he demanded, too startled to be furious. "What have I done —are you ill?" She shook her head and crouched down by the tea-table, her elbows crashing among the cups and saucers, as she hid her face in her trembling hands. "I don't m the least understand. But then I never did understand—women "

There was some contempt in the last word, and his voice was becoming angry. "Does this mean that you have changed your mind, that you don't care for me after all. If it's so, just say it "

She raised her eyes and looked at him again. His tone was a challenge. And again the wave of utter love and longing swept over her as she saw the power of the whole man as he stood erect. She had met- him, the man who had called to her out of a wilderness of nothing, the one being who could liberate the pent-up capacity for loving within her, who could gratify the craving to abase herself, who would bo worth losing the world for. She had found him. And she must give him up. What was the matter, she wondered. Why couldn't slip accept it? She would never meet it again. Why must she give him up? Involuntarily her arms went out to him.

Instantly the puzzled anger went out. of his face, and exultation filled it. He came to her.

"It isn't so? You <lo care: I know you do. You couldn't have pretended— Come to me—Sara " Oh, the magic of her name on his lips! It gripped her, shook her with feeling, which, ebbing, left her weak and sore. But she rose and faced'him, one hand grasping the table, feeling at "Yes! Yes, I do love you. I want you to know that. But I will not give myself'to-you. You can't make me. I won't." He stared at her in silence, while the ano-er that had possessed him vanished before the sense of something unyielding. His face paled, stiffened again into cool control. • , , , "You say you love me? he repeated. She nodded. "But you won't marry me ? Then you must tell me why— Perhaps you're not freel'- he blazed ° U Her tender pity welled up to meet the jealous Tage in his face._ "No, no, it s not that. I m free. 1 love you; It's not—easy to give you up _>> Her face quivered as she realised what his going away meant to her. "It's killing." She said it under her breath. "But I can't marry you. It s that you don't feel —Oil, I can t tell von. You wouldn't understand it i did tell you. But it is hopeless. 1 03 \cain he faced her in silence, scanning her face, the agony of privation m her eves. There was no doubt of her suttering. Some band around his heart was breaking at the sight of it. "You love me?" he repeated, wonderinglv. "And you are free. Yet you won't marry me? Because for some reason, you think it would not be right?" . , "Yes," she said, and waited. . He turned away from her and stood, thinking. At last he turned on her a face that was fervid, with admiration. "You are plucky, he said. 1 tell you, I couldn't do that! His recognition gave life to her. bhe roused herself and stood to face him. The gleaming folds of Iter gown clung to her and gave the effect of shmiiiK armor around her erect figure. Sh was very tall, and her oycs, with tlieii Diana-glow of spiritual aloofness, eon 1 look into his almost trom a I,"' a- moment their looks met, like the silence of two armed forces charge has been sounded. Then the.v clashed and- the struggle between the wavered: Harthen put all th° force of liini into the determination to conquer, and Sara answered with a ouiet that forbade » . , And then, in the silence a_ miracle happened. For the flash faded out of the red-brown eyes with the shadows around them of black velvet, and Sara's soul looked forth. +-u: nf r A proud and sliv and thing it. was. that had hidden itself timidlj while., the gallant woman of her went forth to conquest. Proud as it- was, it. had lived humbly, companioned b> sweet and loving thoughts, and known only bv its messengers of gentle deeds. Hidden as it was, it had longed passionately to be known. But no woman..

save the mother who had so wonderfully equipped her, guessed it; and' to no man had she shown it, until she revealed it to this one. And as he stood, in abeyance before her eyes —whose very light- was but as the shadow of it—his blindness, made in truth by the very downright honesty of him, was cured. At last he knew her. He looked into her soul and loved.

He bent his head, and with a gentleness that was like the kneeling of a lesser man, his hand groped for hers, and took it into his. He looked at it wonderingly, adoringly, its white sweetness seemed so strange there in the grim brown hand whose whole life had been to tear down, where hers had been to cherish. The lover carried: it to his lips with a halting, awkward movement, and kissed it—his lips Tiad barely touched it before they let it go. "I am more than sorry that I havertroubled you," lie said, and stopped. "I am so sorry that—l ' suppose—it keeps me from being sorry for myself. But I'll go away now—since you can't —go with me." He turned, ." liad walked jbalf the length of the room before she called him. Her words were almost unintelligible, between laughing and crying. But he heard ; "Come back —I never could explain —you couldn't understand — ' But—oh. come back —I will go with you—l will!" She tried to make it clear, although she only half understood, herself. But he wouldn't let her; for he didn't care. What difference did it make what had held them apart, and what now united them? They were too wise to spoil their perfect moment, and it would have taken time.

Sb they clung together, splendid man and splendid woman, enlocked, his one arm as strong as two. They only knew that, as their lips met, they readied the joy they had been hungry for. How could they know that, as love wove the spell of trembling lips 011 tremblinglips, their.souls had slid together?