to do with it. I am only
grateful that it has not ended worse. If I had married Robin and then
discovered these things----"

"Don't say that you couldn't have forgiven me, Nell." The General took
out a big white silk handkerchief and wiped his forehead with it. "Don't
say that you couldn't have forgiven me! I meant it all for the best. My
little Nell couldn't be hard with her old father."

She stooped suddenly and caught his hand to her lips. She noticed with a
tender contraction of her heart that it was an old hand--knotted, with
purple stains.

"I should be a brute if I could be angry with you," she said; and the
tenseness of her face relaxed to its old softness.

"Ah, that's right, Nell--that's right. We couldn't do without each
other. You've always your old father, you know--haven't you, dearie?--no
matter what happens. I'll stand by you, Nell. I'll take you away. No one
shall be angry with my Nell."

"You are too good to me," she said. "And I've been angry with you! What
a wretch I was to be angry with you! On my way here I telegraphed to
Robin to come this evening. I must get it over. You shall take me away
if you will afterwards. I would stay and face it if it would do any
good, but it wouldn't. After all, there is no great harm done. Robin's
heart will not be broken."

"And afterwards, Nell?"

"Afterwards? Oh, you and I shall be together."

"Yes; we did very well when we were together. Listen, Nell." He put his
arm about her. "I want you to be strong and brave. I came home to tell
you, lest you should hear by accident. His poor sister did not know----"

The General's den looked out on the Square gardens. It was quite a long
way across them to the road; yet through the quietness of the golden
afternoon there came the shouting of the newsboys. It all flashed on
Nelly with a blinding suddenness. To be sure, they had been calling the
same thing while she stood with his sister and learned why he had left
her, only she had not known.

"He is dead," she said, with an immense quietness. It was as though she
had known it always.

"No; not dead, Nell--terribly wounded, but not dead. He is in English
hands."

He stopped, shuddering. If he had been in those black devils' hands to
be tortured to death! He had been only saved by a sudden rush of his
men. Even his wounds would not have saved him from torture if God had
not delivered him out of their hands.

"Show it to me."

All of a sudden she saw the newsp