sighed. "I wanted to do something. I'd
have been disappointed to wake up and find I'd only dreamed after
all--to find that I was back in London. I was afraid for a minute it was
the day of--but it's all right now. How is it that you're here? It
seems----"

"Oh, I just happened to be travelling in Belgium with the Dalziels when
the war broke out, and we got caught. They've gone now, but I stayed.
The nurses let me help them a little. I do the best I can. I told them
I'd met you at home. But every one here calls you 'Monsieur Mars.' They
know no other name."

"Don't let them know any other. Don't let any one know."

"I won't. You needn't worry! Now, will you sleep, please?--or they may
think I'm doing you more harm than good."

"You do me the greatest good. I'll sleep, yes. But first--tell me one
thing more; about the _Golden Eagle_. I planed down part of the way, but
the motor'd stopped working. The last I remember is when I began to
fall."

"The _Eagle's_ safe," I assured him. "Hardly hurt at all; and there's a
Belgian flying man in Liege to-day, Simon Sorel, who knows you. His
mechanic is working on the _Golden Eagle_. She'll be ready for you when
you're ready for her."

"That will be soon. Good man, Sorel!" he said, and closed his eyes.
"Little Peggy!" I heard him muttering later. But three minutes afterward
he had dropped into a natural sleep.

"Magnifique!" was the Belgian doctor's verdict in his next round, when
Eagle had waked again, and had been attended by a nurse wiser and more
experienced than I. There was little that I was allowed to do for him,
but that little was a joy worth being born for; and I could have died of
happiness to see how, when he was awake and fully conscious, his eyes
followed me when I moved about. But it was better to live than to die
just then, and I did live with all my might. I lived in every nerve and
vein for those two days while "Monsieur Mars" was my patient. After the
first twenty-four hours he insisted that he was well enough to be
changed into the ward above, and leave his bed on the ground floor to
some one more seriously injured. On the second day he sat up in a
reclining chair, and announced that twelve hours more would see him out
of hospital. Doctors and nurses protested that he would throw himself
back into a fever, and the consequences might be serious; but as at that
very time the danger of the town being taken was imminent, arguments for
prudence lost their forc