the lad was grateful and devoted. He had been set to labour in the nickel mines; but that came near to killing him, and again through Laflamme's pleadings he was made a prisoner of the first class, and so relieved of all heavy tasks. Not even he suspected the immediate relations of Laflamme and Carbourd; nor that Laflamme was preparing for escape.

As Laflamme waited for the summons to huts, a squad of prisoners went clanking by him, manacled. They had come from road-making. These never

heard from wife nor child, nor held any communication with the outside world, nor had any speech with each other, save by a silent gesture-language that eluded the vigilance of the guards. As the men passed, Rive Laflamme looked at them steadily. They knew him well. Some of them remembered his speeches at the Place Vendôme. They bore him no illwill that he did not suffer as they. Laflamme made a swift sign to a prisoner near the rear of the column. The man smiled, but gave no answering token. This was part of the unspoken vocabulary of imprisonment, and, in this instance, conveyed the two words: I iscape.

A couple of hours later Laflamme rose from his hammock in his hut, and leant over the young lad, who was sleeping. He touched him gently.

The lad waked: "Yes, yes, monsieur." "I am going away, my friend."

44

Away? To escape like Carbourd?" Yes, I hope, like Carbourd."” "May I not go also, monsieur? I am not afraid."

"No, lad. If there must be death one is enough. You must stay. Good bye."

"You will see my mother?-She is old and she grieves."

"Yes, I will see your mother. And more. You shall be free. I will see to that. Be patient, little comrade. Nay, nay, hush. . . . No thanks. Adieu ! And he put his hands on the lad's shoulder and kissed his forehead.

"I wish I had died at the Barricades. But, yes, I will be brave; be sure of that."

"You shall live in France, which is better. Once more, Adieu!" and Rive Laflamme passed out.

It was raining. He knew that if he could satisfy the first sentinel he should stand a better chance of escape, since he had had so much freedom of late; and to

Ah,

The sentinel knew him. Laflamme," he said, and raised the point of his bayonet. The paper was produced. It did not entitle him to go about at night, and certainly not beyond the enclosure without a guard; it was insufficient. In unfolding the paper Laflamme purposely dropped it in the mud. He hastily picked it up, and, in doing so, smeared it. He wiped it, leaving the signature comparatively plain nothing else.

"Well," said the sentinel, "the signature is right, but it is not like an order. Where do you go?"

"To Government House."

"I do not know that I should let you pass. But-well, look out that the next sentinel doesn't bayonet you. You came suddenly upon me.'

The

The

The next sentinel was a Kanaka. previous formula was repeated. Kanaka examined the paper long, and then said: "You cannot pass."

"But the other sentinel passed me. Would you get him into trouble?"

The Kanaka frowned, hesitated, then said: "That is another matter. Well, pass!"

Twice more the same formula and arguments were used. At last he heard a voice in challenge that he knew. It was that of Maillot. This was a more difficult game. His order was taken with a malicious sneer by the sentinel. At that instant Laflamme threw his arms swiftly round the other, clapped a hand on his mouth, and, with a dexterous twist of leg, threw him backwards, till it seemed as if the spine of the soldier must break. It was impossible to struggle against this trick of wrestling which Laflamme had learned from a famous Cornish wrestler, in a summer spent on the English coast.

"If you shout or speak I will kill you," he said to Maillot; and then dropped him heavily on the ground, where he lay senseless. The other stooped down and felt his heart. "Alive!" he said; then seized the rifle and plunged into the woods. The moon at that moment broke

through the clouds, and he saw the Semaphore like a ghost pointing towards Pascal River. He waved his hand towards his old prison, and with tightly pressed lips sped away.

But others were thinking of the Semaphore at this moment others saw it indistinct yet melancholy in the moonlight. The Governor and his wife saw it; and Madame Solde said: "Alfred, I shall be glad when I shall see that no more, and all no more."

"My wife, you have too much feeling." "I suppose Marie makes me think more of it to-day. She wept this morning at the thought of all this misery and punishment."

"You think that. Well, perhaps something more

"What more?"

"We have done wrong in this-the poor child! Besides, she has, I fear, another sorrow coming. It showed itself to me to-day for the first time." Then she whispered to him, and he started, and sighed, and said at last :

"But it must be saved-by ! it shall be saved. And you love her so, my wife."

And at that moment Marie Gorham was standing in the open window of the library of Pascal House. She had been thinking of her recent visit to the King's Cave, where she had left food; and of the fact that Carbourd was not there. She raised her face towards the moon and sighed ; she was thinking of something else. She was not merely sentimental, for she said as if she had heard the words of the Governor and Madame Solde: “Oh, if it could be saved!"

There was a rustle in the shrubbery near her. She turned towards the sound. A man came quickly towards her. "I am Carbourd," he said, "I could not find the way to the Cave. They were after me. They have tracked me. Tell me quick how to go."

She swiftly gave him directions, and he darted away. Again there was a rustle in the leaves, and a man stepped forth. Something glistened in his hands,-a rifle,

though she could not see it plainly. It was levelled at the flying figure of Carbourd. There was a report. Marie Gorham started forward with her hands on her temples and a sharp cry ;-she started forward into-absolute darkness. But there was a man's footsteps going swiftly by her. Why was it so dark? She stretched out her hands with a moan. "Oh, mother! Oh, mother!" she cried," I am blind!"

But her mother was sleeping unresponsive beyond the dark-beyond all dark. It was perhaps natural that she should cry to the dead and not to the living.

Marie Gorham was blind. She had known it was coming, and it had tried her, as it would have tried any of the race of women. She had, when she needed it most, put love from her, and would not let her own heart speak, even to herself. She had sought to help one who loved her, and to fully prove the other,though the proving she knew was not necessary--before the darkness came ; but here it was suddenly achieved by the sharp disturbance of a rifle-shot. It would have sent a shudder to a stronger heart than hers, that, in reply to her call on her dead mother, there came from the trees the shrill laugh of the mopoke-the sardonic bird of the South.

As she stood there, with this tragedy enveloping her, the dull boom of a cannon came across the valley. "From Ducos," she said. "He has escaped. God help us all!” And she turned and groped her way into the room she had left.

She

She

She

She felt for a chair and sat down. must think of what she now was. wondered if Carbourd was killed. listened, and thought not, since there was no sound without. But she knew that the house would be roused. She bowed her head in her hands. Surely she might weep a little for herself-she who had been so troubled for others. It is strange, but she thought of her flowers and birds, and wondered how she should tend them; of her own room which faced the north-the English north that she loved so well; of her horse, and marvelled if he would know that she could not see him; and, lastly, of a widening horizon. of pain, spread before the eyes of her soul, in which her father and another moved.

It seemed to her that she sat there for hours; it was in reality minutes only. A firm step and the opening of a door roused her. She did not turn her head

Perhaps. . . . I do not know.”

She had risen but she did not turn towards him. He came nearer to her. The enigmatical tone struck him strangely, out he could find nothing less commonplace to say than, "You don't prefer the exaggerated gloaming, do you?"

"No, I do not prefer the gloaming, but why should not one be patient?"

46

"Be patient!" he repeated, and came nearer still. Are you hurt or angry?" "I am hurt, but not angry."

"What have I done?-or is it I?"

"It is not you. You are very good and noble. It is nobody but God. . . . I am hurt, because He is angry, perhaps." "Tell me what is the matter. Look at me." He faced her now-faced her eyes looking blindly straight before her.

"Murray Farling," she said, and she put her hand out slightly, not exactly to him, but as if to protect him from the blow which she herself must deal: "I am looking at you now."

"Yes, yes, but so strangely, and not in my eyes."

I cannot look into your eyes, because, Murray, I am blind." And her hand went further out towards him.

He took it silently and pressed it to his bosom as he saw that she spoke true; and the shadow of this thing fell on him. The hand held to his breast felt how he was trembling from the shock.

"Sit down, dear friend," she said, "and I will tell you all; but do not hold my hand so, or I cannot."

And sitting there face to face, with deep furrows growing in his countenance, and a quiet sorrow spreading upon her cheek and forehead, she told the story how, since her childhood, her sight had

played her false now and then, and within the past month, had grown steadily uncertain. "And now," she said at last, "I am blind. . . I think I should like to tell my father-if you please. Then when I have seen him and poor Angers, if you would come again! There is work to be done. I hoped it would be finished before this came; but there, good friend, do go; I will sit here quietly."

She could not see his face, but she heard him say, "My love, my love," very softly, as he rose to go and she smiled sadly to herself. She folded her hands in her lap, and thought, not bitterly, not listlessly, but deeply. She wanted to consider all cheerfully now; she tried to do so. She was musing among those flying perceptions, those nebulous facts of a new life, experienced for the first time: she was now not herself as she had been another woman was born; and she was feeling carefully along the unfamiliar path which she must tread. She was not glad that these words ran through her mind continuously at first:

"A land of darkness as darkness itself, and of the shadow of death without any order, and where the light is darkness."

Her brave nature rose against the moody spirit which sought to take possession of her, and she cried out in her heart valiantly: "But there is order, there is order. I shall feel things as they ought to be. I think I could tell now what was true and what was false in man or woman; it would be in their presence not in their faces."

She stopped speaking. She heard footsteps. Her father entered. Murray Farling had done his task gently, but the old planter, selfish and hard as he was, loved his daughter; and the meeting was bitter for him. The prop of his pride seemed shaken beyond recovery. But the girl's calm comforted them all, and poignancy became dull pain. Before parting for the night Marie said to Farling; "This is what I wish you to do for me to bring over two of your horses to Point Assumption on the river ;—there is a glen beyond that as you know, and from it runs the steep and dangerous Brocken Path across the hills. I wish you to wait there until Monsieur Laflamme and Carbourd come by the river—that is their only chance. If they get across the hills they can easily reach the sea. know that two of your horses have been over the path; they are sure-footed; they would know it in the night. Is it not so?'

I

"It is so. There are not a dozen horses in the colony that could be trusted on it at night, but mine are safe. I shall do all you wish."

She put out both her hands and felt for his shoulders, and let them rest there for a moment, saying: "I ask much, and I can give no reward, except the gratitude of a girl who would rather die than break a promise. It isn't much, but it is all that is worth your having. Good-night. Good-bye!"

"Good-night. Good-bye," he gently replied; but he said something beneath his breath, that sounded determined, devoted, noble.

The next morning while her father was gone to consult the chief army-surgeon at Noumea, Marie strolled with Angers in the grounds. At length she said: "Angers, take me to the river, and then on down, until we come to the high banks." With her hand on Angers' arm, and in her face that passive gentleness which grows so sweetly from sightless eyes till it covers all the face, they passed slowly towards the river. When they came to the higher banks covered with dense scrub, Angers paused, and told Marie where they were.

"Find me the she-oak tree," the girl said; "there is only one, you know."

"Here it is, my dear. hand is on it now.

There, your

"Thank you. Wait here, Angers, I shall be back presently."

"But oh, my dear

"Please do as I say, Angers, and do not worry:" and the girl pushed aside some bushes, and was lost to view. She pressed along vigilantly by a descending path, until her feet touched rocky ground. She nodded to herself, then pressing between two bits of jutting rock at her right, immediately stood at the entrance to a cave, hidden completely from the river and from the barks above. At the entrance, for which she felt, she paused and said aloud: "Is there any one here?" Something clicked far within the cave. It sounded like a rifle. Then stealthy steps were heard, and a voice said:

"Ah, mademoiselle!"

"You are Carbourd?"

"Yes, mademoiselle, as you see.' 'You escaped safely then from the rifleshot? Where is the soldier?"

"He fell into the river. He was drowned."

"You are telling me the truth?"

"Yes, he stumbled in and sank-on my soul!"

You mean you did not try to save him."

"He lied and got me six months in irons once; he called down on my back one hundred and fifty lashes, a year ago; he had me kept on bread and water, and degraded to the fourth class, where I could never hear from my wife and children-never write to them. I lost one eye in the quarries because he made me stand too near a lighted fuse

"Poor man! poor man!" she said. "You found the food I left here for you?"

"Yes, God bless you! And my wife and children will bless you too if I see France again."

You know where the boat is?" "Yes, I know."

"When you reach Point Assumption you will find horses there to take you across the Brocken Path. Monsieur Laflamme knows. I hope that you will both escape; that you will be happy in France with your wife, and children, and Monsieur Laflamme with his art."

"You will not come here again?"

"No. If Monsieur Laflamme should not arrive. . . . and you should go alone, leave one pair of oars; then I shall know. Good-bye."

"Good-bye, mademoiselle. A thousand times I will pray for you. Ah, mon Dieu! take care!-you are on the edge of the great tomb.

She stood perfectly still. At her feet was a dark excavation where was the skeleton of Ovi the King. This was the hidden burial place of the modern Hiawatha of these savage islands, unknown even to the natives themselves, and kept secret with a half-superstitious reverence by Marie Gorham, who had discovered it a few months before.

"I had forgotten," she said. "Please take my hand and set me right at the entrance."

"Your hand, mademoiselle?

Mine is

"It is dark to me, for I am blind." "Blind! blind! Oh, the pitiful thing! Since when, since when, mademoiselle?

Since the soldier fired on you the shock. . .

The convict knelt at her feet. "Ah, mademoiselle, you are a good angel. I shall die of grief. To think-for such as me!"

"You will live to love your wife and

children. This is the will of God with me. . . . Am I in the path now?-Ah, thank you."

"But, Monsieur Laflamme-this will be a great sorrow to him."

Twice she seemed about to speak, but nothing came save good-bye. Then she crept cautiously away among the bushes and along the narrow path, the eyes of the convict following her. She had done a deed which, she understood, the world would blame her for if it knew, would call culpable or foolishly heroic; but she smiled, because she understood also, that the spotless heart and perfect mind cast. out fear, and are safe among the lions.

At this time Rive Laflamme was stealing watchfully through the tropical scrub, where hanging vines tore his hands, and the sickening perfume of jungle flowers overcame him more than the hard journey which he had undergone during the past twelve hours.

Several times he had been within voice of his pursuers, and once a Kanaka scout passed close to him. He had had nothing to eat, he had had no sleep, he suffered from a wound in his neck caused by the broken protruding branch of a tree; but he had courage, and he was struggling for liberty a tolerably sweet thing when one hasn't it. He found the Cave at last, and with far greater ease than Carbourd had done, because he knew the ground better, and his instinct was keener. greeting to Carbourd was nonchalantly cordial :

His

"Well you see, comrade, King Ovi's Cave is a reality."

“Yes, so.”

"I saw the boat. It is safe. The horses? What do you know?"

"The horses also will be at Point Assumption to-night."

"Then we go to-night. We shall have to run the chances of rifles along the shore at a range something short, but we have done that before, at the Barricades eh, Carbourd?"

"At the Barricades. . . . It is a pity that we cannot take Citizen Louise Michel with us."

"Yes, a pity, but her time will come." "She has no children crying and starving at home like"

"Like yours, Carbourd, like yours. Well, I am starving here. Give me something to eat. . . . Ah, that is good -excellent! What more can we want but freedom! Till the darkness ( tyranny be overpast,-overpast, eh?"

This speech brought another weighty matter to Carbourd's mind. He said:

"I do not wish to distress you, but--"

"Now, Carbourd, what is the matter? faugh! this place smells musty. What's that?-a tomb? . . . . Speak out, Citizen Carbourd."

"It is this: Mademoiselle Gorham is blind." And then Carbourd told the story with a great anxiety in his words.

"The poor mademoiselle! is it so? A thousand pities. So kind, so young, so beautiful. Ah, I am distressed, and I finished her portrait yesterday. Yes, I remember her eyes looked too bright, and then again too dull; but I thought that it was excitement, and so-that!

Rive Laflamme's regret was real enough up to a certain point, but, in sincerity and value, it was chasms below that of Murray Farling, who, even now, now, was getting two horses ready to give the Frenchmen their chance.

After a pause Laflamme said: "She will not come here again, Carbourd? No? Ah, well, perhaps it is better so; but I should have liked to speak my thanks to her. She is so kind!"

That night Marie Gorham sat by the window of the sitting-room, with the light burning, and Angers asleep in a chair beside her, sat till long after midnight, in the thought that Laflamme, if he had reached the Cave, would, perhaps, dare something to see her and bid her goodbye. She would of course have told him not to come, but he was chivalrous, and then her blindness would touch him. . . Yet as the hours went by the thought came was he, was he so chivalrous? was he altogether true? . . . He did not come. The next morning Angers took her to where the boat had been, but it was gone, and no oars were left behind. So both had sought escape in it.

She went to the Cave. She took Angers with her now. Upon the wall a paper was found. It was a note from Rive Laflamme. She asked Angers to give it to her without reading it. She put it in her pocket and kept it there until she should see Murray Farling. He should read it to her. And she said sometimes as she felt the letter in her pocket: "He loved me. It was the least that I could do. I am so glad." Yet she was not altogether glad either, and disturbing thoughts crossed the parallels of her pleasure.

It was the Governor and Madame Solde