rophied by the constant cruelties, the
excesses, the mercilessness which his service under this fraternising
republic constantly demanded of him?

Perhaps some recollection of former years, when first he served his King
and country, recollection of wife or sister or mother pleaded within
him in favour of this sorely-stricken woman with the look of unspeakable
sorrow in her large blue eyes.

Certain it is that as soon as Marguerite passed the barrier he put
himself on guard against it with his back to the interior of the cell
and to her.

Marguerite had paused on the threshold.

After the glaring light of the guard-room the cell seemed dark, and at
first she could hardly see. The whole length of the long, narrow cubicle
lay to her left, with a slight recess at its further end, so that from
the threshold of the doorway she could not see into the distant corner.
Swift as a lightning flash the remembrance came back to her of proud
Marie Antoinette narrowing her life to that dark corner where the
insolent eyes of the rabble soldiery could not spy her every movement.

Marguerite stepped further into the room. Gradually by the dim light of
an oil lamp placed upon a table in the recess she began to distinguish
various objects: one or two chairs, another table, and a small but very
comfortable-looking camp bedstead.

Just for a few seconds she only saw these inanimate things, then she
became conscious of Percy's presence.

He sat on a chair, with his left arm half-stretched out upon the table,
his bead hidden in the bend of the elbow.

Marguerite did not utter a cry; she did not even tremble. Just for one
brief instant she closed her eyes, so as to gather up all her courage
before she dared to look again. Then with a steady and noiseless step
she came quite close to him. She knelt on the flagstones at his feet and
raised reverently to her lips the hand that hung nerveless and limp by
his side.

He gave a start; a shiver seemed to go right through him; he half raised
his head and murmured in a hoarse whisper:

"I tell you that I do not know, and if I did--"

She put her arms round him and pillowed her head upon his breast. He
turned his head slowly toward her, and now his eyes--hollowed and rimmed
with purple--looked straight into hers.

"My beloved," he said, "I knew that you would come." His arms closed
round her. There was nothing of lifelessness or of weariness in the
passion of that embrace; and when she looke