"You are a wise man, Sergeant," said Bathurst, jovially. "Off with you! straight along that road you see before you. The cottage is just beyond that clump of distant firs, there you’ll see the bridle path. But I’ll overtake you before then, never fear. Time to give my horse a handful of oats..." But even while he spoke the Sergeant had called "Attention!" "I’ll not fail you, sir," he shouted excitedly. "A hundred guineas! odd’s my life! ’tis a fortune! Left turn! Quick march!" The young man stood in the doorway and watched the little squad as, preceded by their Sergeant, they plodded their way northwards in quest of fortune. John Stich too followed them with his eyes, until the bend in the road hid the red coats from view. Then both turned and came within. But Lady Patience through it all never looked at the soldiers; her eyes, large, glowing, magnetic, were fixed upon the stranger in the forge, as if in a trance of joy and gratitude. CHAPTER XI THE STRANGER’S NAME Mistress Betty was the first to recover from terror and surprise. She too had fixed a pair of large and wondering eyes upon the stranger. "’Tis the gentleman who brought the letter from his lordship last night," she whispered to her mistress. Patience closed her eyes for a moment: her spirit, which had gone a-roaming into the land of dreams, where dwell heroes and proud knights of old, came back to earth once more. "Then he must have guessed my brother was here," she murmured, "and did it to save him." But the tension being relaxed, already the bright and sunny nature, which appeared to be the chief characteristic of the stranger, quickly re-asserted itself, and soon he was laughing merrily. "Oh! ho! gone, by my faith!" he said to John. "Odd’s life! but he swallowed that, clean as a mullet after bait, eh, friend Stich?" It seemed as if he purposely avoided looking at Patience: perhaps, with the innate delicacy of a kindly nature, he wished to give her time to recover her composure. But now she came forward, turning to him with a gentle smile that had an infinity of pathos in it. "Sir," she said, "I would wish to thank you..." He put up his hand, with a gesture of self-deprecation. "To thank me, madam?" he said, with profound deference. "Nay! you do but jest. I have done nothing to deserve so great a favour." He bowed to her with perfect courtly grace, but she would not be gainsaid. She wished to think that he had acted thus for her. "Sir, you wrong your own most noble deed," she said. "Will you not allow me to keep the sweet illusion, that what you did just now, you did from the kindness of your heart, and because you saw that we were all anxious ... and that ... I was unhappy..."