He was hurt and had made light of it, but one of the soldiers had remarked that he was bleeding and she waited now for him, dreading yet vaguely hoping that he was really wounded--oh! only slightly!--but still wounded so that she might wait on him. So strange is a woman’s heart when first it wakes from the dreams, the unrealities, the fairy-worlds of childhood! With beating heart Lenora listened to that slowly-advancing footstep--how slow it seemed! as if it had lost that elasticity which but a few moments ago had carried Mark bounding down this same street. Now it dragged and finally came to a halt, just as Mark’s figure emerged into the shaft of light thrown along the wall by the street lamp close to which Lenora was standing. She smothered a little cry and ran forward to meet him, for she had seen his figure sway, and halt, then lean heavily against the wall. "You are hurt!" she exclaimed, even before she reached him. At sound of her voice, he pulled himself together, and in a moment had straightened out his shoulders and was walking quite steadily toward her. "Madonna!" he cried in astonishment, "what are you doing here?" "Oh! I ... I..." she murmured, a little ashamed now that she met his pleasant, grey eyes fixed so kindly upon her, "I heard the noise ... I became anxious...." "It was only a street-brawl," he said, "not fit for you to witness." Even now, though he spoke quite firmly, his voice sounded weary and weak. "You are hurt!" she reiterated. "Hurt? No!" He laughed, but the laughter died on his lips: he had to steady himself against the wall, for a sudden dizziness had seized him. "I pray you take my arm," she insisted. "Can you walk as far as the tavern?" "Indeed I can," he retorted, "on my honour ’tis a mere scratch." "An you’ll not take my arm," she said peremptorily, "I’ll call for help." "Heaven forbid!" he exclaimed gaily. "I should be laughed at for a malingerer. Shall we return to the tavern, Madonna? and will you not take mine arm?" He held his right arm out to her, but as he did so she noticed that he kept the other behind his back. She did take his arm, however. It was obviously best--since he was more severely hurt than he cared to admit--to go at once back to the tavern, and dress the wound there with water and clean linen. They walked in silence side by side. It was only a matter of an hundred yards or so, and after a very few moments they reached the porch of the "Merry Beggars," and as the buxom hostess was standing there, vaguely wondering what had happened to her guests, Lenora at once despatched her off for a basin of clean warm water and her very softest linen towels. Then she went into the _tapperij_, and Mark followed her.