" she hastily replied, and stooped for
the performance.

The unfastening was not such a trifling affair. The rowel of the
spur had so wound itself among the gimp cords in those few moments,
that separation was likely to be a matter of time.

He too stooped, and the lantern standing on the ground betwixt them
threw the gleam from its open side among the fir-tree needles and the
blades of long damp grass with the effect of a large glowworm. It
radiated upwards into their faces, and sent over half the plantation
gigantic shadows of both man and woman, each dusky shape becoming
distorted and mangled upon the tree-trunks till it wasted to nothing.

He looked hard into her eyes when she raised them for a moment;
Bathsheba looked down again, for his gaze was too strong to be
received point-blank with her own. But she had obliquely noticed
that he was young and slim, and that he wore three chevrons upon his
sleeve.

Bathsheba pulled again.

"You are a prisoner, miss; it is no use blinking the matter," said
the soldier, drily. "I must cut your dress if you are in such a
hurry."

"Yes--please do!" she exclaimed, helplessly.

"It wouldn't be necessary if you could wait a moment," and he unwound
a cord from the little wheel. She withdrew her own hand, but,
whether by accident or design, he touched it. Bathsheba was vexed;
she hardly knew why.

His unravelling went on, but it nevertheless seemed coming to no end.
She looked at him again.

"Thank you for the sight of such a beautiful face!" said the young
sergeant, without ceremony.

She coloured with embarrassment. "'Twas unwillingly shown," she
replied, stiffly, and with as much dignity--which was very little--as
she could infuse into a position of captivity.

"I like you the better for that incivility, miss," he said.

"I should have liked--I wish--you had never shown yourself to me by
intruding here!" She pulled again, and the gathers of her dress began
to give way like liliputian musketry.

"I deserve the chastisement your words give me. But why should such
a fair and dutiful girl have such an aversion to her father's sex?"

"Go on your way, please."

"What, Beauty, and drag you after me? Do but look; I never saw such
a tangle!"

"Oh, 'tis shameful of you; you have been making it worse on purpose
to keep me here--you have!"

"Indeed, I don't think so," said the sergeant, with a merry twinkle.

"I tell you you have!" she exclaimed, in high temper