he housed?"

He looked relieved. "She has a room next door. Starling we have taken
in with us. I would rather have a tethered elk. He is so big he fills
the whole place."

Now, square issues please me. "Dubisson, why has no one offered to
take me to my wife?"

The man laughed rather helplessly. "'T is from no lack of respect for
either of you, monsieur. But you said nothing, and Starling"----

"Yes, it is from Starling that I wish to hear."

"Well, Starling has said---- Monsieur, why repeat the man's gossip?"

"Go on, Dubisson."

"After all, it is only what the Englishman has said. Madame, so far as
I know, has said nothing. But Starling has told us that yours was a
marriage of form only,--that the woman consented under stress, and
now"----

"And now regretted it?"

"I am only quoting Starling. Monsieur, would you like to see your
wife?"

I rose. "Yes. Will you send word and see if I may?"

Dubisson bowed and left me with a speed that gave me a wry smile. The
laughter-loving lieutenant hated embarrassment as he did fast-days, and
I had given him a bad hour.

He was back before I thought it possible.

"She will see you at once in the commandant's waiting-room." He looked
at me oddly.

"Your wife is a queenly woman, monsieur."

The lights shone uncertainly in the commandant's waiting-room. It was
the room where I had met the English captive. From a defiant boy to a
court lady! It was a long road, and I was conscious of all the steps
that had gone to make it. I went to the woman in silk who waited by
the door. She stood erect and silent, but her eyes shone softly
through a haze, and when I bent to kiss her hand I found that she was
quivering from feet to hair.

"Monsieur!" she whispered unsteadily, "monsieur!" Then I felt her
light touch. "God is good. I have prayed for your safety night and
day. Ah--but your shoulder! They did not tell me. Are you wounded,
monsieur?"

I was cold as a clod. She had forgiven Starling. She had walked with
him. I answered the usual thing mechanically. "My shoulder,--it is a
scratch, madame." I kept my lips on her hand, and with the feeling her
touch brought me I could not contain my bitterness. "Madame, you wear
rich raiment. Does that mean that you and Lord Starling are again
friends?"

She drew away. "Monsieur, should we not be friends?"

"Have you forgiven Lord Starling, madame?"

She looked at me with wistful quiet. In her str