st lay
back against the chair, the paroxysm over, a little spot of blood showed
and spread upon his white lips. With a pained, shuddering little gasp
she caught her handkerchief from her bosom, and, running one hand round
his shoulder, quickly and gently caught away the spot of blood, and
crumpled the handkerchief in her hand to hide it from him.

"Oh! poor fellow, poor fellow!" she said. "Oh! poor fellow!"

Her eyes filled with tears, and she looked at him with that look which
is not the love of a woman for a man, or of a lover for a lover, but
that latent spirit of care and motherhood which is in every woman who is
more woman than man. For there are women who are more men than women.

For himself, a new fact struck home in him. For the first time since
his illness he felt that he was doomed. That little spot of blood in
the crumpled handkerchief which had flashed past his eye was the fatal
message he had sought to elude for months past. A hopeless and ironical
misery shot through him. But he had humour too, and, with the taste
of the warm red drop in his mouth still, his tongue touched his lips
swiftly, and one hand grasping the arm of the chair, and the fingers of
the other dropping on the back of her hand lightly, he said in a quaint,
ironical tone:

"'Dead for a ducat!'"

When he saw the look of horror in her face, his eyes lifted almost gaily
to hers, as he continued:

"A little brandy, if you can get it, mademoiselle."

"Yes, yes. I'll get some for you--some whiskey!" she said, with
frightened, terribly eager eyes.

"Alcide always has some. Don't stir. Sit just where you are." She ran
out of the room swiftly--a light-footed, warm-spirited, dramatic little
thing, set off so garishly in the bodice with the plush trimming; but
she had a big heart, and the man knew it. It was the big-heartedness
which was the touch of the man in her that made her companionable to
him.

He said to himself when she left him:

"What cursed luck!" And after a pause, he added: "Good-hearted little
body, how sorry she looked!" Then he settled back in his chair, his eyes
fixed upon her as she entered the room, eager, pale and solicitous. A
half-hour later they two were on their way to the farmhouse, the work
of despoiling going on in the Manor behind them. Ferrol walked with an
easy, half-languid step, even a gay sort of courage in his bearing. The
liquor he had drunk brought the colour to his lips. They were now hot
and red, a