inct, another sound was added to it, the sound
of a horse galloping over hard ground. Both officers turned their
faces away from the yellow entrenchment with its brown streak of gun,
below them and looked towards a roofless white-walled farmhouse on the
left, of which the rafters rose black against the sky like a gigantic
gallows. From behind that farmhouse an aide-de-camp galloped up to the
fire.

"I want the officer in command of this battery," he cried out and
Geoffrey stood up.

"I am in command."

The aide-de-camp looked at the subaltern in an extreme surprise.

"You!" he exclaimed. "Since when?"

"Since yesterday," answered Faversham.

"I doubt if the General knows you have been hit so hard," the
aide-de-camp continued. "But my orders are explicit. The officer in
command is to take sixty men and march to-morrow morning into St.
Denis. He is to take possession of that quarter, he is to make a
search for mines and bombs, and wait there until the German troops
march in." There was to be no repetition, he explained, of a certain
unfortunate affair when the Germans after occupying a surrendered fort
had been blown to the four winds. He concluded with the comforting
information that there were 10,000 French soldiers under arms in St.
Denis and that discretion was therefore a quality to be much exercised
by Faversham during his day of search. Thereupon he galloped back.

Faversham remained standing a few paces from the fire looking down
towards Paris. His companion petulantly tossed a branch upon the fire.

"Luck comes your way, my friend," said he enviously.

Geoffrey looked up to the stars and down again to Paris which with
its lights had the look of a reflected starlit firmament. Individual
lights were the separate stars and here and there a gash of fire,
where a wide thoroughfare cleaved, made a sort of milky way.

"I wonder," he answered slowly.

Max started up on his elbow and looked at his friend in perplexity.

"Why, you have sixty men and St. Denis to command. To-morrow may bring
you your opportunity;" and again with the same slowness, Geoffrey
answered, "I wonder."

"You joined us after Gravelotte," continued Max, "Why?"

"My mother was German," said Faversham, and turning suddenly back to
the fire he dropped on the ground beside his companion.

"Tell me," he said in a rare burst of confidence, "Do you think a
battle is the real test of courage? Here and there men run away to be
sure. But how