"Was it true what I have just heard,--was she really here?"

"Miss Kellett, do you mean? Yes; she carried up the news to you herself?

It was she that tied the handkerchief on your wounded artery, too, and saved your life."

"Here,--in the Crimea? It cannot--cannot be!" sighed Conway.

"She is not the only noble-hearted woman who has left home and friends to brave perils and face hardships, though, I own, she stands alone for heroism and daring."

"So, then, it was not a delusion,--I did actually see her in the trenches?" said Conway, eagerly.

"She was in the advanced parallel the night the Russians surprised the 5th. She was the first to give the alarm of the attack."

"Only think, doctor, of what happened to me that night! I was sent up at speed to say that reinforcements were coming up. Two companies of the Royals were already in march. My horse had twice fallen with me, and, being one-armed, I was a good deal shaken, and so faint when I arrived that I could scarcely deliver my message. It was just then a woman--I could only perceive, in the darkness, that she seemed young--gave me her brandy-flask; after drinking, I turned to give it back to her, but she was gone. There was no time to search for her at such a moment, and I was about to ride away, when a 'carcasse,' exploding on one of the redoubts, lit up the whole scene for a considerable space around, and whom should I see but Jack Kellett's sister, cheering the men and encouraging them to hold their ground?

[Illustration: 406]

I could have sworn to her features, as I could now to yours; but that she could really be there seemed so utterly impossible that I fancied it was a delusion. Nay," added he, after a pause, "let me tell the whole truth. I thought it was a warning! Ay, doctor, the weight is off my heart now that I have confessed this weakness." As Conway spoke, he seemed, indeed, as though he had relieved himself of some mighty care; for already his eye had regained its lustre, and his bold features recovered their wonted expression. "Now," cried he, with a renovated vigor, "I have done with false terrors about second sight, and the rest of it I am myself again."

"You can listen to my tidings, then," said Reggis, seating himself at the bedside, and at once beginning a narrative, to which I am obliged to own Conway did not always pay a becoming attention, his thoughts still reverting to very different scenes and incidents from those which the lawyer recounted. Indeed, more than once was the narrator's patience sorely tried and tested. "I am doing my very best to be brief, sir. I am limiting myself strictly to a mere outline of the case," said he, in something of pique: "It _might_ interest you,--it _ought_ to interest you!"

"If the doctor yonder will promise me health and years to enjoy all this same good fortune, so it will interest me," cried Conway. "What does the income amount to?"

"If we only recover the English estates, it will be something under twelve thousand a year. If we succeed with, the Irish, it will be about three more."

"And how far are we on the road to this success?" "One verdict is already won. The first action for ejectment on title has been brought, and we are the victors. Upon this, all your counsel are agreed, your claim to the Viscounty rests."

"I can scarcely credit--scarcely picture it to myself," said Conway, half aloud. "My mind is confused by the thought of all the things I wish to do, if this be true. First of all, I want to purchase Jack Kellett's commission."

"If you mean Miss Kellett's brother, he is already gazetted an ensign, and on his way to join his regiment in India."

"And how do you know this?"

"She told me so herself."

"She! When and where have you seen her?"

"Here, at headquarters; in Sebastopol, where we were prisoners together; at the camp yesterday, where we parted."

"My poor head cannot bear this," said Conway, painfully; "I am struggling between the delight of all these good tidings and a terrible dread that I am to awake and find them but a dream. You said that she was here in the camp?"

"That she is. If you but heard the cheer that greeted her arrival! It began at the advanced pickets, and swelled loader and louder, till, like the roar of the sea, it seemed to make the very air tremble. There, hear that! As I live, it is the same shout again."

"Here comes the General and his staff into the court below," said the doctor, hurrying away to receive them.

As the sounds of a distant cheer died away, the noise of horses' feet resounded through the courtyard, and the clank of musketry in salute announced the arrival of an officer of rank.

"I declare they are coming this way," cried Mr. Reggis, rising in some confusion, "and I heard your name spoken. Coming, I have no doubt, to see _you_."

"The General of your division, Conway, come to ask after you," said an aide-de-camp, entering, and then standing aside to make place for a venerable, soldier-like man, whose snow-white hair would have graced a patriarch.

"I have come to shake your hand, Conway," said he, "and to tell you we are all proud of you. There is nothing else talked of through our own or the French camp than that daring feat of yours; and England will soon hear of it."

A deep blush of manly shame covered Conway's face as he listened to these words; but he could not speak.

"I have been talking the matter over with the General Commanding-in-chief," resumed he, "who agrees with me that the Horse Guards might, possibly, recognizing your former rank of Captain, make you now a Brevet-major, and thus qualify you for the Bath."

"Time enough, General, for that," said Conway. "I have a very long arrear of folly and absurdity to wipe out ere I have any pretension to claim high rewards."

"Well, but if all that I hear be true, we are likely to lose your services here; they have a story abroad about a peerage and a vast fortune to which you have succeeded. Indeed, I heard this moment from Miss Kellett--"

"Is she here, sir?--can I see her?" cried Conway, eagerly.

"Yes. She has come over to say good-bye; for, I regret to say, she too is about to leave us to join her brother at Calcutta."

A sickly paleness spread itself over Conway's cheeks, and he muttered, "I must see her--I must speak with her at once."

"So you shall, my poor fellow," said the other, affectionately; "and I know of no such recompense for wounds and suffering as to see her gentle smile and hear her soft voice. She shall come to you immediately."

Conway covered his face with his hand, to conceal the emotion that stirred him, and heard no more. Nor was he conscious that, one by one, the persons around him slipped noiselessly from the room, while into the seat beside his bed glided a young girl's figure, dressed in deep black, and veiled.

"Such a fate!" muttered he, half aloud. "All this, that they call my good fortune, comes exactly when I do not care for it."

"And why so?" asked a low, soft voice, almost in his very ear.

"Is this, indeed, you?" cried he, eagerly. "Was it _your_ hand I felt on my temples as I lay wounded outside the trenches? Was it your voice that cheered me as they carried me to the rear?"

She slightly bent her head in assent, and murmured, "Your old comrade's sister could not do less."

"And now you are about to leave me," said he, with an overwhelming sorrow in the tone.

She turned away her head slightly, and made no answer.

"I, who am utterly alone here," said he, in a broken voice. "Is this, too, like my old comrade's sister?" There was a peevishness in the way he spoke this of which he seemed himself to be ashamed the moment the words were uttered; and he quickly added, "What a fellow I am to say this to you!--you, who have done so much for me,--you, who promised to be a daughter to my poor mother when I am gone!"

"But you are not to take this gloomy view," said she, hastily; "the surgeons all pronounce you better; they agree that your wounds progress favorably, and that, in a week or two, you may be removed to Constantinople, and thence to England."

He gave a faint, sickly smile of most melancholy meaning.

"And what will not the cheery, bracing air of those Welsh mountains do, aided by the kind care of that best of nurses, a fond mother?"

"And where will you be by that time?" asked he, eagerly.

"Journeying away eastward to some far-away land, still more friendless!"

said she, sadly.

"This, then, is the sum of all my good fortune, that when life opens fairly for me, it shall be bereft of all that I care for!" cried he, wildly.

Terrified by the excited tone in which he spoke, as well as by the feverish lustre of his eyes, Sybella tried to calm and soothe him, but he listened--if, indeed, he heard her--with utter apathy.