to
France and perish in battle. I will throw me in the castle pool. I
will--"

So the poor lad retreated, muttering hot and angry words, all his
heart sore within him because of the cruelty of this girl.

But he had not proceeded twenty steps along the corridor, when he
heard the door softly open and a low voice whispered, "Sholto! Sholto!
I want you, Sholto!"

He bent his brows and strode manfully on as if he had not heard a
word.

"Sholto!--dear Sholto! Do not go, I need you."

Against his will he turned, and, seeing the head of Maud Lindesay, her
pouting lips and beckoning finger, he went sulkily back.

"Well?" he said, with the stern curtness of a military commander, as
he stood before her.

She held the iron lamp in her hand. The wick had fallen aside and was
now wasting itself in a broad, unequal yellow flame. The maid of
honour looked at it in perplexity, knitting her pretty brows in a mock
frown.

"It burned me as I was ordering my hair," she said. "I cannot blow it
out. I dare not. Will you--will you blow it out for me, Captain
Sholto?"

She spoke with a sweet childlike humility.

And she held the lamp up so that the iron handle was almost touching
her soft cheek. There was a dancing challenge in her dark eyes and her
lips smiled dangerously red. She could not, of course, have known that
the light made her look so beautiful, or she would have been more
careful.

Sholto stood still a moment, at wrestle with himself, trying to
conquer his dignity, and to retain his attitude of stern disapproval.

But the girl swept her lashes up towards him, dropped them again dark
as night upon her cheek, and anon looked a second time at him.

"I am sorry," she said, more than ever like a child. "Forgive me,
and--the lamp is so hot."

Now Sholto was young and inexperienced, but he was not quite a fool.
He stooped and blew out the light, and the next moment his lips rested
upon other lips which, as it had been unconsciously, resigned their
soft sweetness to his will.

Then the door closed, and he heard the click of the lock as the bolts
were shot from within. The gallery ran round and round about him like
a clacking wheel. His heart beat tumultuously, and there was a strange
humming sound in his ears.

The captain of the guard stumbled half distracted down the turret
stair.

The old world had been destroyed in a moment and he was walking in a
new, where perpetual roses bloomed and the spring birds sang fo