running down your face--the Country Bumpkin has hurt you! Oh, I am glad! glad! glad!" and she laughed again. "I might have run away," she went on mockingly, "but you see--I was prepared for you," and she held up the knife, "prepared for you--and now--you are pale, and hurt, and faint--yes, you are faint--the Country Bumpkin has done his work well. I shall not need this, after all--see!" And she flung the knife upon the table.

"Yes--it is better--there," said I, "and I think--madam--is --mistaken."

"Mistaken?" she cried, with a sudden catch in her voice, "what --what do you mean?"

"That I--am--the Bumpkin!" said I.

Now, as I spoke, a black mist enveloped all things, my knees loosened suddenly, and stumbling forward, I sank into a chair. "I am--very--tired!" I sighed, and so, as it seemed, fell asleep.

CHAPTER IV

WHICH, AMONG OTHER MATTERS, HAS TO DO WITH BRUISES AND BANDAGES

She was on her knees beside me, bathing my battered face, talking all the while in a soft voice that I thought wonderfully sweet to hear.

"Poor boy!" she was saying, over and over again, "poor boy!" And after she had said it, perhaps a dozen times, I opened my eyes and looked at her.

"Madam, I am twenty-five!" said I. Hereupon, sponge in hand, she drew back and looked at me.

A wonderful face--low-browed, deep-eyed, full-lipped. The eyes were dark and swiftly changeful, and there was a subtle witchery in the slanting shadow of their lashes.

"Twenty-five!" she repeated, "can it really be?"

"Why not, madam?"

"So very young?"

"Why--" I began, greatly taken aback. "Indeed, I--that is--"

But here she laughed and then she sighed, and sighing, shook her head.

"Poor boy!" said she, "poor boy!" And, when I would have retorted, she stopped me with the sponge.

"Your mouth is cut," said she, after a while, "and there is a great gash in your brow."

"But the water feels delicious!" said I.

"And your throat is all scratched and swollen!"

"But your hands are very gentle and soothing!"

"I don't hurt you, then?"

"On the contrary, the--the pain is very trifling, thank you."

"Yet you fainted a little while ago."

"Then it was very foolish of me."

"Poor--" she hesitated, and looking up at her through the trickling water, I saw that she was smiling.

"--fellow!" said she. And her lips were very sweet, and her eyes very soft and tender--for an Amazon.

And, when she had washed the blood from my face, she went to fetch clean water from where I kept it in a bucket in the corner.

Now, at my elbow, upon the table, lay the knife, a heavy, clumsy contrivance I had bought to use in my carpentry, and I now, mechanically, picked it up. As I did so the light gleamed evilly upon its long blade.

"Put it down!" she commanded; "put it away--it is a hateful thing!"

"For a woman's hand," I added, "so hideously unfeminine!"

"Some men are so hatefully--hideously--masculine!" she retorted, her lip curling. "I expected--him--and you are terribly like him."

"As to that," said I, "I may have the same colored eyes and hair, and be something of the same build--"

"Yes," she nodded, "it was your build, and the color of your eyes and hair that--startled me."

"But, after all," said I, "the similarity is only skin-deep, and goes no farther."

"No," she answered, kneeling beside me again; "no, you are--only twenty-five!" And, as she said this, her eyes were hidden by her lashes.

"Twenty-five is--twenty-five!" said I, more sharply than before.

"Why do you smile?"

"The water is all dripping from your nose and chin!--stoop lower over the basin."

"And yet," said I, as well as I could on account of the trickling water, for she was bathing my face again, "and yet, you must be years younger than I."

"But then, some women always feel older than a man--more especially if he is hurt."

"Thank you," said I, "thank you; with the exception of a scratch, or so, I am very well!" But, as I moved, I caught my thumb clumsily against the table-edge, and winced with the sudden pain of it.

"What is it--your hand?"

"My thumb."

"Let me see?" Obediently I stretched out my hand to her.

"Is it broken?"

"Dislocated, I think."

"It is greatly swollen!"

"Yes," said I, and taking firm hold of it with my left hand, I gave it a sudden pull which started the sweat upon my temples, but sent it back into joint.

"Poor--"

"Well?" said I, as she hesitated.

"--man!" said she, and touched the swollen hand very tenderly with her fingers.

"You do not fear me any longer?"

"No."

"In spite of my eyes and hair?"

"In spite of your eyes and hair--you see, a woman knows instinctively whom she must fear and whom not to fear."

"Well?"

"And you are one I do not fear, and, I think, never should."

"Hum!" said I, rubbing my chin, "I am only twenty-five!"

"Twenty-five is--twenty-five!" said she demurely.

"And yet, I am very like--him--you said so yourself!"

"Him!" she exclaimed, starting. "I had forgotten all about him. Where is he--what has become of him?" and she glanced apprehensively towards the door.

"Half way to Tonbridge--or should be by now."

"Tonbridge!" said she, in a tone of amazement, and turned to look at me again.

"Tonbridge!" I repeated.

"But he is not the man to--to run away," said she doubtfully --"even from you."

"No, indeed!" said I, shaking my head, "he certainly did not run away, but circumstances--and a stone, were too much--even for him."

"A stone?"

"Upon which he--happened to fall, and strike his head--very fortunately for me."

"Was he--much hurt?"

"Stunned only," I answered.

She was still kneeling beside my chair, but now she sat back, and turned to stare into the fire. And, as she sat, I noticed how full and round and white her arms were, for her sleeves were rolled high, and that the hand, which yet held the sponge, was