“I have letters from cousin Will, telling me so, and lamenting his death, for he was much attached to him.”
“Did you not hear the soldier to-day charge Walter with being a spy?”
“I did not hear the name of the man they were looking for—it surely was not Walter?”
The rosy flush that rose to her cheeks made Marie turn faint. Could it be that her sister cared for him yet?
“Do not look at me as if you doubted me. That foolish passion has burned itself out. My only hope is that he lives, so that I may repair, in a measure, the wrong I have done you both. When I have seen you pining, my heart has ached for you.”
“Oh, Helen dear, how good you are!”
The twilight deepened, as they sat there, and a shot was heard, which brought them both to their feet. Another rang out, and with a wild cry of alarm the girls fled from the house, toward the spot from whence they came. Marie saw a form fleeing into the darkening woods, and heard the command “Halt!” It never paused, and as the soldiers raised their rifles to fire, she sprang almost in front of their weapons, and cried—“Do not fire again. You have killed him.”
“We have not fired at all. It was not our shot that struck him, but we were about to fire on the man who wounded him, and whom you saw running away,” Sergeant Hughes said, respectfully.
At a short distance they found Walter Ryder, who was wounded in the side, and as they carried him back to camp, he said—
“Take me to the Lieutenant. I can prove my innocence.” Marie and Helen threw themselves into each other's arms. Old Lois wrung her hands in despair.