"Oh, Kattie!" And he could say no more for the feeling that was in him, and Kattie hung on to his arm and he did not shake her off. "Kattie," he said at last, in a deep hoarse voice, "has it been my fault? I did not know----" "No no, no! It was not your fault. But I could not help it." "I am very sorry, dear. If I had known--but I never dreamt of it. How did you get here?" She hesitated, and then said, briefly: "I got some one to bring me." "Who?" "I cannot tell you." "It was an evil thing to do, whoever it was, and I hope some of the sorrow will fall upon him," he said hotly. "But you must not stop here, Kattie. You must go home." "Home!" she said wildly. "I have no home. I will wait here till you come back from the war, Jim----" "Kattie! . . . For God's sake, don't talk like that! You don't know what you are saying, child. I may never come back at all . . . And if I do----" "Oh, Jim! _Jim!_" She hardly knew what she was saying. She only knew that for months she had been longing for Jim, and now he was here, and he was going, and she might never see him again. The pretty, quivering, wild-rose face was turned up to his. Her eager arms stole round his neck. "_Jim!_" Now, thanks be to thee, Charles Eager, muscular Christian and strenuous apostle of clean living and the higher things!--sitting by your dying fire in Mrs. Jex's cottage at Wyvveloe, thinking much of your boys and praying for them, perchance,--nay, of a certainty, for thoughts such as yours are prayers and resolve themselves into familiar phrases--"that they fall into no sin, neither run into any kind of danger"--"from battle and murder and from sudden death,"--at which the thinker by the fire fell into deeper musing. And thanks be to all your teaching of the Christian virtues and truest manhood, both by precept and example! For Jim Carron was only a man like other men, and young blood is hot. And Kattie, in her fervour, was more than pretty. Jim's big chest rose and fell as if he had been running a race--say with the devil, or as if he had been engaged in mortal combat. Perhaps he had--both. He broke her hands apart with a firm, gentle grip. "Kattie dear! You don't know what you are saying. You know it can't be. God help us! What am I to do with you?" And then he bethought him of Mme Beteta and saw his way. "Come with me!" he said, and drew her arm tightly through his and led her down the street, and on and on till they came to a thoroughfare where there were cabs. He hailed one, handed her in, gave the driver the address, and sat down beside her. Kattie asked no questions. She was with Jim. That was enough. Her arm stole inside his again and nestled and throbbed there. She would have asked no more--not very much more--than to ride by his side like that in the joggling cab for ever. The cab stopped at last before the house in South Audley Street. Jim jumped out and rang the bell, paid the man, and led her up the steps.