But already I was becoming sensible of the ever-living enchantment of this young thing, so wise in stratagems and spoils of Love, and I chose to leave my scalp hang drying at her lodge door beside the scanter pol of Billy Alexander. For God knows this vixen-virgin spared neither young nor old, but shot them through and through at sight with those heavenly darts from her twin eyes. And no man, so far, could boast of obtaining from Mistress Swift the least token or any serious guerdon that his quest might lead him by a single step toward Hymen's altar, but only to that cruel arena where all her victims agonized under the mocking sweetness of her smile, and her pretty, down-turned and merciless thumbs--the little Vestal villain! "No, Claudia," quoth I, "you have taken my bow and spear, and shorn me of my thatch like any Mohawk. No; I go to Fonda's Bush----" I smiled, "--to heal, perhaps, my heart, as you say; but, anyhow, to consult my soul, and armour it in a wilderness." "A hermit!" she exclaimed scornfully, "--and afeard of a maid armed only with two matched eyes, a nose, a mouth and thirty teeth!" "Afeard of a monster more frightful than that," said I, laughing. "Of what monster, John Drogue?" "Of that red monster that is surely, surely creeping northward to surprise and rend us all," said I in a low voice. "And so I shall retire to question my secret soul, and arm it cap-à-pie as God directs." She was looking at me intently. After a silence she said: "I do love you; and Billy Alexander; and all gay and brave young men whose unstained swords hedge the women of County Tryon from this same red monster that you mention." And watched me to see how I swallowed this. I said warily: "Surely, Claudia, all women command our swords ... no matter _which cause we espouse_." "Jack!" "I hear you, Claudia." But, "Oh, my God!" she breathed; and put her hands to her face. A moment she stood so, then, eyes still covered by one hand, extended the other to me. I kissed it lightly; then kissed it again. "Do you leave us, Jack?" I understood. "It is you who leave me, Claudia." She, too, understood. It was my first confession that all was not right betwixt my conscience and my King. For that was the only thing I was certain about concerning her: she never betrayed a confidence, whatever else she did. And so I made plain to her where my heart and honour lay--not with the King's men in this coming struggle--but with my own people. I think she knew, too, that I had never before confessed as much to any living soul, for she took her other hand from her eyes and looked at me as though something had happened in which she took a sorrowful pride. Then I kissed her hand for the third time, and let it free. And, going: "God be with you," she said with a slight smile; "you are my dear friend, John Drogue." At the Hall porch she turned, the mischief glimmering in her eyes: "--And so is Billy Alexander," quoth she. So she went into the darkened Hall.