believe, John?" she questioned softly. The Major stood
silent and with head averted. "This dear old coat!" she murmured.
"Dost remember how I sewed these buttons on?"

"Aye, I remember!" he groaned.

"And--wilt believe, my John?" she questioned, and drew nearer yet,
until despite her soft and even tone, he could feel against him the
swell and tumult of her bosom; yet he stood with head still averted and
arms, that yearned to clasp her, rigid at his sides. "Wilt believe,
John?"

"Betty," he answered, "ask me to believe the sun will rise no more and
I'll believe, but not--not this!"

"Yet, dost love me--still?" she whispered.

"Aye, my lady--through life to death and beyond. The love I bear you
is a love stronger than death and the agony of heartbreak and dead
hopes. Though you take my heart and trample it in the dust that heart
shall love thee still--though you profane the worship that I bear you
still shall that worship endure--though you strip me of fame and honour
and rob me of my dearest ideals still, ah still shall I love you
until--until----" His voice broke and he bowed his head. "O Betty!"
he cried. "In God's name show me--a little mercy--let me go!"

And turning he limped away and left her standing alone.

IV

The Colonel's fierce eyes were transfigured with a radiant tenderness,
his gruff voice was grown strangely soft and tender, his sinewy hand
had sought and found at last those white and trembling fingers, while
two soft eyes were looking up into his, eyes made young with love, and
bright with happy tears.

Seeing all of which from without the casement, my lady Betty, choking
back her own grief, smiled, sobbed and, stealing away, crept softly
upstairs to her room, locked herself in and, lying face down upon her
bed, wept tears more bitter than any she had ever known.

CHAPTER XL

OF THE ONSET AT THE HAUNTED MILL

A wild, black night full of wind and rain and mud--a raging, tearing
wind with rain that hissed in every vicious gust--a wind that roared
fiercely in swaying tree-tops and passing, moaned dismally afar; a wind
that flapped the sodden skirts of the Major's heavy riding-coat, that
whirled the Sergeant's hat away into the blackness and set him cursing
in French and Dutch and English.

"What is't, Zeb?" enquired the Major during a momentary lull as they
rode knee and knee in the gloom.

"My hat sir ... the wind with a cur----" The words were blown away and
the Sergeant