no crime. She had come to know her too well, her exquisite
gentleness, so oddly combined with a blind determination that took no
thought of self. Besides she recalled her friend's final words, "a
follower of the Prince of Peace." Surely there were but few such
followers in the European world today!

Awaiting his answer, Nona continued to look at her companion. The young
Russian might have stood for the figure of "Mars," the young god of war,
as he strode along beside her. He was six feet in height, splendidly
made, and tonight in the semi-darkness his face showed hard and unmoved.

"I am grieved but not surprised at what you tell me," he returned the
next moment. "Not a hundred, but a thousand times I have warned Sonya
that she must give up her mad ideas. There was sufficient danger in them
when the world was at peace. Now in time of war to preach that men are
brothers, that there should be no such thing as patriotism, that all men
are kin, no matter what their country, there never was such folly. It is
hard to feel pity or patience."

"Then you will do nothing to help?" Nona inquired, trying to hide the
anger she felt. "Of course I understand that from your point of view
and from the view of nearly all the world Sonya Valesky is hopelessly
wrong. But I can't see why she should be punished because she has a
higher ideal than other people?"

If Nona had only thought for a moment she would have realized that the
world has always thus rewarded its visionaries.

"But Sonya is not content to think in this way alone. She has spent her
life in trying to persuade other persons to her view, and has many
followers. Once she was a very rich woman and traveled in many lands
preaching her universal brotherhood," the young officer ended his speech
with a characteristic shrug of his shoulders, which is the Oriental
fashion of announcing that fate is stronger than one's will.

"To have continued advocating such a doctrine in a time of war was worse
than madness. I have done what I could, I have even risked my own honor
and safety in remaining Sonya's friend. Now retribution has come," he
concluded, as though the subject was not to be resumed.

And Nona did not reply at once. So the young Russian officer and the
American girl walked on toward the fortress through darkness that was
each moment growing more dense. There were no lights save the stars,
since the fortress was only dimly lighted in the interior; outside
lights would to