“With such a constitution, to act as he hath acted is to outman us all. Good Lord! is the thing stuffed fit to burst with the poor creature’s curiosities? Whatever her mishaps, she must save those, it seems. Empty them out, Betty, on the floor--here, pellmell, beside me; and I will test the value of my surmise. Bah! frogs and sloughed skins and bones! A loathsome collection; and she was like a flaming Dryad of the woods. Here is a rat’s skull, and here----” He paused, gave out a hard breath, and suddenly struggled to get to his feet. The girl flew to him. “What are you at?” she cried. “Oh! you will hurt yourself.” His face was pale and bore a startled look. “Help me up!” he muttered. “Nay, wench, I must--I must! ’Tis here, the villainous thing, in my hand!” He held open his palm. A chalky lump was in it--a worthless-looking fragment. “What is that but rubbish?” she said. “Rubbish? Why, so it is, Betty, but ’tis the rubbish fools strangle one another to possess. I must go to him, the dying man. I was right. It has lain there thrown away while we were cutting throats. He must see it and know it before he passes. Good God! Betty, Betty, I must go to him, I say!” He was so wild and impatient in his efforts to rise that she bent all trembling to help him, as the wiser policy. “And will you be sick again,” she said, “and break my heart?” “I should be sick to remain. There--I am up and steady. Give me your fine, firm arm, Betty, and lead me to his bed.” Very slowly and shakily he made his way to the coach-house; but, when he was come there, he stood erect, almost without support, and took in the melancholy scene. Dennis, white and haggard, started up from a stool on which he was seated beside a rough pallet stretched on the ground; but his master put a finger to his lips, and motioned him to silence. Then he went and sat himself down on the vacant seat and looked upon the stricken man. “Luvaine!” he said, softly. The dying soldier stirred and gave out a little moan. His face was so scorched and disfigured with gunpowder as to be hardly recognizable, and all the upper part of his body was swollen to grotesque proportions; but the coat that had been drawn over his paralyzed lower limbs lay as flat as though nothing but its natural folds raised it from the floor. “Luvaine,” said Tuke again, “can you hear me?” As he spoke the door was opened, and Sir David entered. He looked a fagged and worn little man, but a light of bantam heroism glinted in his eyes. “Tuke!” he exclaimed in astonishment. “I have slept, Blythewood, and have found a little of myself again. There is something more I have found--hush, man! the stone.” “Great God!” He closed the door and came forward, gasping. “The stone!” he said, in a hoarse whisper. Tuke nodded. “Hush!” he murmured again. “He hears, I think.”