The receptivity of the object of his grace in this instance was blunted by misunderstanding. “Well, now,” the Major replied, knitting his brows, “there was a foreign nobleman--a native of Saxony,--for a time on the staff of General Lancaster while I, too, was a member of his military family. This stranger was eager to see our artillery in action,--greatly interested in the Gatling gun,--it was new, then, invented by a gentleman from North Carolina. But I don’t remember that the officer’s name was Athelstane,--my memory is not so good as it once was,--his name has escaped me. But he had been a lieutenant of the Line in his own country,--light artillery.” Colonel Kenwynton observed Floyd-Rosney’s satiric smile and resented it. He would not suffer the matter to rest here. “Mr. Floyd-Rosney is alluding to a character in one of the Waverley novels, Major,” he said tactfully. “Eh? Oh, I remember, now,--I remember,--Ivanhoe,--Athelstane of Coningsburgh,” the Major replied casually. “But I was thinking of that foreign nobleman from Saxony,--much impressed by the Gatling gun in action.” The war was all-in-all with the Major. Miss Hildegarde Dean suddenly rose and, with her swinging athletic gait, walked across the deck and seated herself in a chair beside the Major. He was conscious, of course, of an approach and a new proximity, but whose presence it was and of what intent he could not divine. He turned his sightless face toward his unseen neighbor, expressive of a courteous abeyance, ready and reciprocal toward the advance were it charged with a meaning for him, yet with a dignity of reserve in awaiting it. He, of course, could not see Hildegarde smiling at him so brightly that one must needs deplore afresh his affliction which debarred him from such suffusive and gracious radiance.