I lit my candles, got my pipe going, and drew my chair near the fire to read and smoke. It was, however, early days yet for me to read for long. Moreover, by habit I had picked up my Virgil, and it was as yet impossible for me to feel the tips of my fingers in the teeth-marks without thinking of the poor wretch who had made them. I could see in exactest detail his dead body lying in the road and Swift Nicks beside it, pitching the bag of guineas up and down in the air, and smiling gleefully and yet wistfully at me. From that grim event, whether my mind travelled backwards or forwards, it traversed scenes such as few men are privileged, or fated, to pass through. It was, again, too soon for me to realize the full effect of my experiences on myself. I was not moody, as in the days aforetime. I neither loathed my lot nor cursed my destiny. I had seen warfare and bloodshed, I had had my heart wrung and my nerves racked, and now the peaceful meadows winding along the river and stretching up to the purple hills were dear to eyes from which the scales had fallen. This was the life and labour on which the world was based, and it was worthy of any man. I had seen Death the Harvester at work, and he was a less alluring figure than Joe Braggs with a flashing sickle in his hand and a swathe of golden grain under his arm. I should never be really alone again. I had company of which I should never tire as I sat here with my memories. Margaret was rarely absent from my mind, and every memory of her was a blessing and an inspiration. I did not regret my love, foolish and vain as it had been. The thing that really mattered was that Jack was alive. I could now look back on everything without bitterness. If Margaret came for me now, to call me forth to another hard round of struggle and adventure, I should be off with her like a shot. She had made a splendid companion. She would make a splendid marchioness. Some day, when the pain would not be unendurable, I would go to London and steal another peep at those matchless eyes and that tower of golden, gleaming hair. I did not hear the door open, but I heard mother's calm voice, gently reproving Jane for an unseemly giggle. A pair of arms crept round my neck, and slim white fingers cupped my chin. Kate did not know that it was I who had so nearly sent her sweetheart to an untimely grave, for Jack had sternly forbidden me to mention the subject to anyone, and, as I have said, it might never have happened so far as he was concerned. Therefore Kate, always a loving and attentive sister, was now more loving and attentive than ever because she knew in her heart that, though I had gained much in my wanderings, I had lost the one thing she had found in the quiet sickroom where, during long weary months, she had lured Jack back to life. It was always her task to fetch me from my books and my thoughts to the beloved circle in the house-place, when, as now, she had prepared a dish of tea for us.