Martin Conisby

"The moon is wondrous bright, friend," said he, staring up at it, "but so have I seen it many a night; but mark this, never in all our days shall we see again the like o' her that sleeps, Martino, that sleeps--below here!" And here he falls to soft mutterings and to patting that small mound of sand again.

"Come!" said I at last, touching his bowed shoulder. "Come!"

"Where away, camarado?" he questioned, looking up at me vacantly. "Nay, I'm best here--mayhap she'll be lonesome-like at first, so I'll bide here, lad, I'll bide here a while. Go your ways, brother, and leave old Resolution to pray a little, aye--and, mayhap weep a little, if God be kind."

So in the end I turned, miserably enough, and left him crouched there, his head bowed upon his breast. And in my mind was horror and grief and something beside these that filled me with a great wonder. Reaching the cave, I saw the sand there all trampled and stained with the blood she had shed to save mine own, and hard beside these, the print of her slender foot. And gazing thus, I was of a sudden blinded by scorching tears, and sinking upon my knees I wept as never before in all my days. And then sprang suddenly to my feet as, loud upon the air, rang out a shot that seemed to echo and re-echo in my brain ere, turning, I began to run back whence I had come.

And so I found Resolution face down across the mound that marked Joanna's grave, his arms clasped about it and on his dead face the marks of many tears.