When he came to himself he was lying in a patch of short grass, with a little knot of men about him, among whom he recognised Jim Weatherby. "I brought them in, didn't I?" he asked, struggling up; and then he saw that his coat sleeves were rent from the armholes, leaving his arms bare beneath his torn blue shirt. Cynthia's warning returned to him, and he laughed shortly. "Well, I reckon you could bring the devil in if you put all your grip on him," was Jim's reply; "as it is, you're pretty sore, ain't you?" "Oh, rather, but I wish I hadn't spoiled my coat." He was still thinking of Cynthia. "God alive, man, it's a mercy you didn't spoil your life. Why, another second and the horses would have been over that bank yonder, with you and young Fletcher under the wagon." Christopher rose slowly from the ground and stood erect. "With me--and who under the wagon?--and who?" he asked in a throaty voice. Jim Weatherby whistled. "Why, to think you didn't know all along!" he exclaimed. "It was Fletcher's boy; he made Zebbadee let him take the reins. Fletcher saw it all and he was clean mad when he got here--it took three men to hold him. He thinks more of that boy than he does of his own soul. What's the matter, man, are you hurt?" Christopher had gone dead white, and the blue circle came out slowly around his mouth. "And I saved him!" he gasped. "I saved him! Isn't there some mistake? Maybe he's dead anyway!" "Bless you, no," responded Jim, a trifle disconcerted. "The doctor's here and he says it's a case of a broken leg instead of a broken neck, that's all." Looking about him, Christopher saw that there was another group of men at a little distance, gathered around something that lay still and straight on the grass. The sound of a hoarse groan reached him suddenly--an inarticulate cry of distress--and he felt with a savage joy that it was from Fletcher. He looked down, drawing together his tattered sleeves. For a time he was silent, and when he spoke it was with a sneering laugh. "Well, I've been a fool, that's all," was what he said. CHAPTER V. The Glimpse of a Bride The next morning he awoke with stiffened limbs and confusion in his head, and for a time he lay idly looking at his little window-panes, beyond which the dawn hung like a curtain. Then, as a long finger of sunlight pointed through the glass, he rose with an effort and, dressing himself hastily, went downstairs to breakfast. Here he found that Zebbadee Blake, who had promised to help him cut his crop, had not yet appeared, owing probably to the excitement of Fletcher's runaway. The man's absence annoyed him at first; and then, as the day broke clear and cold, he succumbed to his ever present fear of frost and, taking his pruning-knife from the kitchen mantelpiece, went out alone to begin work on his ripest plants.