"I think it is a fortnight to-day since you came in, Cuthbert," she answered, quietly. "Thank God you are quite out of danger now, and the doctor says all we have got to do is to build you up." "You have had a hard time of it, child," he said, "though I knew nothing else, I seemed to be conscious that you were always near me." "I have had plenty of sleep, Cuthbert, and am perfectly well," she said, cheerfully. "Then your look belies you," he said, "but I know that it is no use arguing. What has been happening outside?" "Nothing. The troops were withdrawn the day after the fight when you were wounded, and nothing has been done since." "How is Dampierre getting on?" he asked. "He is getting on well, I believe," she replied. "He was delirious and so restless, and talked so loud that the doctor had him carried into another ward so that you should not be disturbed by it. I have not seen him since, but I hear he is going on very well. Your friend Rene has been here twice--indeed he has been every day to inquire--but he was only let in twice. He seems a very kind-hearted fellow and was very cut up about you. I am sure he is very fond of you. He says that Monsieur Goude and the other students have all been most anxious about you, and that he comes as a sort of deputation from them all." Rene had, indeed, quite won Mary's heat by the enthusiastic way in which he had spoken of Cuthbert, and had quite looked forward to the little chat she had with him every morning when he came to the ambulance for news. "He is a grand fellow, mademoiselle," he would say, with tears in his eyes, "we all love him. He has such talents and such a great heart. It is not till now that we quite know him. When a man is dying men speak of things they would not tell otherwise. There are four or five that he has helped, and who but for him must have given up their studies. The rest of us had no idea of it. But when they knew how bad he was, first one broke down and then another, and each told how generously he had come to their aid and how delicately he had insisted upon helping them, making them promise to say no word of it to others. Ma foi, we all cried together. We have lost six of our number besides the five here. The rest, except Dampierre, are our countrymen, and yet it is of your Englishman that we think and talk most." All this was very pleasant to Mary. Cuthbert was now of course nothing to her, but it soothed her to hear his praises. He had been wicked in one respect, but in all others he seemed to have been what she had thought of him when he was a child, save that he developed a talent and the power of steady work, for which she had never given him credit, for on this head Rene was as emphatic as on other points.