The soldier proved himself the very perfection of a Pandar in scarlet and silver. He would as soon have assisted in so romantic an intrigue, for such he fully believed it to be, as have perused one of the most interesting passages in the life of one of Mr. Fielding’s heroes. Jeffray’s mare was discovered safely hidden in the woods where he had left her. One of the pack-horses was saddled and Bess mounted thereon. Two troopers and a guide were ordered to put themselves at Jeffray’s service. “I wish you good speed, sir,” said the cornet, bowing and raising his hat to Bess. Jeffray, charmed by the young man’s urbanity, shook him heartily by the hand. “You will do me the honor of dining with me to-morrow?” he asked. The cornet bowed, his brown eyes brightening with momentary relish. “Certainly, if my duties permit the pleasure,” he said, smiling a tired smile. Into the sweet dusk of the wet woods rode Jeffray with Bess beside him. The western sky was still streaked with gold beyond the trees, but the woods before them were tangled deeps of mysterious gloom. All the June perfumes of the earth streamed out from the brakes and thickets, mingling with the pungent breath of the pines. Bluish vapor filled the hollows, merging into the deep purple of the forest’s shadows. Here and there some rain-pool in the grass was touched with the faint light from the western sky. An infinite languor seemed to weigh upon the calm and misty trees. There was still the dull drip of the storm’s dew from ten thousand branches, the rhythmic plashing of water upon the bracken and the grass. The two red-coats and the rough laborer who acted as guide moved some twenty paces ahead of Jeffray and the girl. There was still some peril of their falling in with the folk who had been scattered from the hamlet, and the troopers kept their carbines ready. Jeffray held the bridle of Bess’s horse, so that they were very close in the dusk. Bess had recovered from her faintness of an hour ago. Jeffray had given her brandy from his flask, though she had refused the bread and meat one of the soldiers had brought her from old Isaac’s cottage. The day’s burden of dread seemed to lift from her as they drew away from the hamlet and its memories, and sank deeper and deeper into the silence of the forest. She was near Jeffray; sometimes her knee touched his. They could almost hear each other breathing, while the sweet smell of the wet woods steamed up like incense into the night. Jeffray appeared sunk in thought. He looked often at Bess with kindlings of tenderness in his eyes. The pleasurableness of life seemed to steal into either heart, chastened by a melancholy born of the troubled happenings of the day. They remembered, both of them, the dead man lying in the grass. It seemed that the blood-red flower of Bess’s dream had colored forth the shedding of Dan’s blood.