There was an instant’s pause. Wilfred looked from Caroline’s flushed, eager face, to Edith’s pale one. After all, what was the harm? He nodded his head, but no one moved. It was the Sergeant who broke the silence. “The lady,” he said, looking at Thorne, and pointing at Edith. As he spoke, he added another order. “Matson, take your squad and guard the windows. Prisoner, you can go over to the side of the room.” The Sergeant’s purpose was plain. It would give Edith Varney an opportunity to say what she had to say to Thorne in a low voice if she chose, without the possibility of being overheard. The initiative must come from the woman, the man realised. It was Edith who turned and walked slowly across the room, Thorne followed her more rapidly, and the two stood side by side. They were thus so placed by the kindness of the veteran that she could speak her words, and no one could hear what they were. “One of the servants,” began the girl in a low, utterly passionless and expressionless voice, “Jonas, has taken the bullets from the guns. If you will drop when they fire, you can escape with your life.” In exactly the same level, almost monotonous, voice, Thorne whispered a pertinent question: “Shall I do this for you?” “It is nothing to me,” said the woman quietly, and might God forgive her, she prayed, for that falsehood. Thorne looked at her, his soul in his eyes. If her face had been carved from marble, it could not have been more expressionless and indifferent. He could not know how wildly her heart was beating underneath that stony exterior. Well, she had turned against him. He was nothing to her. There was no use living any longer. She did not care. “Were you responsible in any way for it?” he asked. The girl shook her head and turned away without looking at him. She had not the least idea of what he was about to do. Not one man in a thousand would have done it. Perhaps if he went to his death in some quixotic way, he might redeem himself in her eyes, had flashed into Thorne’s mind, as he turned to the guard. “Sergeant,” he said, saluting. He spoke in a clear, cool, most indifferent way. “You had better take a look at the rifles of your command. I understand they have been tampered with.” “What the hell!” cried the Sergeant, seizing a piece from the nearest man. He snapped open the breech-plug and drew out the cartridge and examined it. Some one had bitten off the bullet! He saw everything clearly. “Squad ready!” he cried. “Draw cartridges!” There was a rattling of breech-plugs and a low murmur of astonishment, as every man found that his cartridge was without a bullet. “With ball cartridges, load!” cried the Sergeant. “Carry arms!”