"You are hurt?" one man had said--in a kind, gruff way--evidently in deep concern.
"No! no! it's nothing," Mark replied, "a small scratch ... in the scuffle just now...."
"But you are bleeding...."
"And if I am, friend, it won't be the first time in my life. I tell you it's nothing," added Mark with obvious impatience. "Good-night!"
"Good-night!" came in chorus from the men.
V
The measured tramp of booted feet slowly dying away in the distance down the narrow street, told Lenora that at last the men had gone.
But Mark was hurt and she stood waiting at the street corner for she heard his step coming slowly toward her.
He was hurt and had made light of it, but one of the soldiers had remarked that he was bleeding and she waited now for him, dreading yet vaguely hoping that he was really wounded--oh! only slightly!--but still wounded so that she might wait on him.
So strange is a woman's heart when first it wakes from the dreams, the unrealities, the fairy-worlds of childhood! With beating heart Lenora listened to that slowly-advancing footstep--how slow it seemed! as if it had lost that elasticity which but a few moments ago had carried Mark bounding down this same street. Now it dragged and finally came to a halt, just as Mark's figure emerged into the shaft of light thrown along the wall by the street lamp close to which Lenora was standing.