Audrey

"You are right," said Haward, smiling. "The wife of the minister of this

parish was good enough to come to my assistance."

"Ah!" said the Colonel dryly. "Did Atalanta come as well? She is his

reverence's servant, is she not?"

"No," answered Haward shortly to the last question, and, leaning across,

stirred the fire.

The light caused to sparkle a jeweled pin worn in the lace of his ruffles,

and the toy caught the Colonel's eye. "One of Spotswood's golden

horseshoes!" he exclaimed. "I had them wrought for him in London. Had they

been so many stars and garters, he could have made no greater pother! 'Tis

ten years since I saw one."

Haward detached the horseshoe-shaped bauble from the lace, and laid it on

the other's palm. The master of Westover regarded it curiously, and read

aloud the motto engraved upon its back: "'Sic Juvat Transcendere Montes.'

A barren exploit! But some day I too shall please myself and cross these

sun-kissing hills. And so the maid with the eyes is not his reverence's

servant? What is she?"

Haward took the golden horseshoe in his own hand, and fell to studying it

in the firelight. "I wore this to-night," he said at length, with

deliberation, "in order that it might bring to your mind that sprightly

ultramontane expedition in which, my dear Colonel, had you not been in

England, you had undoubtedly borne a part. You have asked me a question; I

will answer it with a story, and so the time may pass more rapidly until

the arrival of Mr. MacLean with our friends who set traps." He turned the

mimic horseshoe this way and that, watching the small gems, that simulated

nails, flash in the red light. "Some days to the west of Germanna," he

said, "when about us were the lesser mountains, and before us those that

propped the sky, we came one sunny noon upon a valley, a little valley,

very peaceful below the heights. A stream shone through it, and there were

noble trees, and beside the stream the cabin of a frontiersman."

On went the story. The fire crackled, reflecting itself in mirrors and

polished wood and many small window panes. Outside, the rain had ceased,

but the wind and the river murmured loudly, and the shadows of the night

were gathering. When the narrative was ended, he who had spoken and he who

had listened sat staring at the fire. "A pretty story!" said the Colonel

at last. "Dick Steele should have had it; 'twould have looked vastly well

over against his Inkle and Yarico. There the maid the savior, here the

man; there perfidy, here plain honesty; there for the woman a fate most

tragical, here"-"Here?" said Haward, as the other paused.

The master of Westover took out his snuffbox. "And here the continued

kindness of a young and handsome preserver," he said suavely, and extended

the box to his host.