When we again stood beside the couch, the girl made an effort to take my hand, but was too weak. Seeing her purpose, I grasped hers instead. "Thank you," she said, in a thin, ghostly little voice. "It was not his fault, uncle; he saved me. Come to see me sometime, and we'll go--rowing again!" She tried to smile, but was too exhausted. "I shall certainly come to inquire about you," I replied, gently laying her hand down. "I fear I was somewhat to blame, and I hope you will be all right very soon." She looked at me with a wan light of gratitude in her eyes, and a few moments later I was bidding Father John adieu on the porch step. "Come again, m'sieu," he said, squeezing my hand warmly. "You shall have ze welcome!" I thanked him, again expressed my hope and belief that his niece would be quite all right in a day or two, and struck out for Hebron. CHAPTER TWELVE IN WHICH I ATTEND AN ORATORIO It is one o'clock in the morning--and I have been going to bed at nine! You will wonder what has happened to so outrageously disturb the rigorous routine governing my night hours, and I shall tell you, for that is the purpose of this chronicle. It is now three days since I went to Hebron. After leaving the priest's house I came on down the hill, trudged back to the river to get my coat and garden seed, then turned homeward. The sun was hot by this time, my clothes quickly dried on me, and I have felt no bad effects since. Another sign, it seems to me, of my increasing physical sturdiness. These three days have passed without sight or sound of a soul. I have pottered about my yard, mowing down the insistent heterogeneous growth which daily now threatens to take me; clearing a broad space about my precious well--whose water, by the way, is sparkling, clear and cold--and this morning spading in my garden for two hours or more. I cannot explain that which follows, but a little before nine, as I was preparing to light my bedtime pipe and sit down for a chuckle with that old pagan monk, Rabelais, I felt the call to go up. As I said, I can offer no explanation. But all of us have been subject, many times in our lives, to sudden, inexplicable yearnings; silent longings as powerful and real as though a voice had spoken them. There is no need to specialize. You, if you have a spark of temperament, will understand, because you will have experienced something of the sort. You have felt that mysterious tugging toward a certain thing, when there was nothing on earth to incite it. What was it? I felt it to-night as I held my pipe in one hand and a lighted match in the other; felt it growing and expanding until it became a fierce desire. I tossed my half-burned match among the logs in the fireplace, put my filled pipe in my pocket, and with something akin to awe sobering my face, drew my cap on my head and walked softly outdoors.