as much as he wanted this, surely one could bring it off.

Hadn't he pulled off races on the scratchiest of polo ponies, when he
couldn't afford better, out of sheer intention? He had meant to win,
moved the pony along, and won. Was life less controllable than a shoddy
polo pony?

He set his mouth and stared grimly out over the sparkling snow. He did
not ask himself how a man with a wife hung round his neck like a
millstone was going to manage the perpetual happiness of a stray young
woman. He never asked himself questions or saw how things were to be
done, but when the crisis came his instinct taught him in a flash the
short cut to victory.

"Now," said Claire, unexpectedly, "you are looking awfully
dangerous--you do rather sometimes, you know--like a kind of volcano
that might go off."

Winn turned his eyes slowly toward her.

"I shall never be dangerous for you, Miss Rivers," he said gently.

He did not know how much he promised her or that he was already
incapable of keeping his promise. She looked away from him with smiling
lips and happy, mysterious eyes. She had known long ago that all the
force he had was as safe with her as if he had laid it in her hands;
safer than that, because he held it in his own--for her.

It seemed to Claire that you were only perfectly secure when you were
with a man who could be dangerous to everybody else, but always safe
for you.

"You will help me with Maurice?" she said softly. "Then I sha'n't feel
worried any more."

"I shouldn't let it worry me for a moment if I were you," Winn assured
her. "He hasn't come to much harm so far. He's young, that's all. I'll
keep my eye on him, of course."

Winn knew quite well what he would do with a subaltern of Maurice's
type. He would take him out shooting and put the fear of God into him.
If this were done often and systematically enough, the subaltern would
improve or send in his papers. But Davos did not offer equal advantages.
One could not get the fear of God everywhere on a tap; besides, there
was Mrs. Bouncing.

Claire turned suddenly toward him.

"I want Maurice," she said rather breathlessly, with shining eyes, "to
be a good soldier; I want him to be like you."

Winn felt a pang of fear; it was a pang that was half horrible pain, and
half passionate and wild delight. Was Claire perfectly safe? Why did
she want Maurice to be like him? It was Claire herself who banished his
fear; she added hastily:

"He really must get