you on your way to England?"

"Yes."

"In that case I can pass you through the German lines, and forward you
at once on your journey."

Mercy looked at him in unconcealed surprise. His strongly-felt interest
in her was restrained within the strictest limits of good-breeding: he
was unmistakably a gentleman. Did he really mean what he had just said?

"You can pass me through the German lines?" she repeated. "You must
possess extraordinary influence, sir, to be able to do that."

Mr. Horace Holmcroft smiled.

"I possess the influence that no one can resist," he answered--"the
influence of the Press. I am serving here as war correspondent of one of
our great English newspapers. If I ask him, the commanding officer will
grant you a pass. He is close to this cottage. What do you say?"

She summoned her resolution--not without difficulty, even now--and took
him at his word.

"I gratefully accept your offer, sir."

He advanced a step toward the kitchen, and stopped.

"It may be well to make the application as privately as possible," he
said. "I shall be questioned if I pass through that room. Is there no
other way out of the cottage?"

Mercy showed him the door leading into the yard. He bowed--and left her.

She looked furtively toward the German surgeon. Ignatius Wetzel was
still at the bed, bending over the body, and apparently absorbed in
examining the wound which had been inflicted by the shell. Mercy's
instinctive aversion to the old man increased tenfold, now that she was
left alone with him. She withdrew uneasily to the window, and looked out
at the moonlight.

Had she committed herself to the fraud? Hardly, yet. She had committed
herself to returning to England--nothing more. There was no necessity,
thus far, which forced her to present herself at Mablethorpe House, in
Grace's place. There was still time to reconsider her resolution--still
time to write the account of the accident, as she had proposed, and
to send it with the letter-case to Lady Janet Roy. Suppose she finally
decided on taking this course, what was to become of her when she found
herself in England again? There was no alternative open but to apply
once more to her friend the matron. There was nothing for her to do but
to return to the Refuge!

The Refuge! The matron! What past association with these two was now
presenting itself uninvited, and taking the foremost place in her mind?
Of whom was she now thinking, in that strange place,