"Please sit down, Liddy. I've fixed a nice seat for you, and now I can talk to you."
Then their eyes met for the second time since starting. Her face and lips were pale, and her eyes full of fear. She clasped her hands before her face as if to ward off the coming blow.
"Tell me now," she said hurriedly, "tell me the worst, only tell me quickly! I've suffered long enough!"
He looked at her a moment pityingly, dreading to deal the blow, and trying to frame it into suitable words—and then it came.
"Liddy," he said in a husky whisper, "I love you, and I've enlisted!"
A brief sentence, but what a message!
A woman's heaven and a woman's hell in six words!
For one instant she looked at him, until its full force came to her and then she burst into tears, and the next moment she was in a heap on the robe-covered rock and sobbing like a child. Instantly he was beside her, gathering her in his arms and kissing her hair, her tear-wet face and lips. Not a word was spoken; not one was needed! He knew now that her heart was his, and for weal or woe; for joy or sorrow, their lives must be as one.
"Don't cry any more, my darling," he whispered at last. "I shall come back all safe, and then you will be my wife, won't you, Liddy?"
She made no answer, but a small, soft hand crept into one of his, and he knew his prize was won.