A dark shape stole up to us, and stood by our side. Then there was a glad neigh and a prolonged snort. The Black Prince had recognised me, and was rubbing his nose against my coat-sleeve.
"I must go, Hugh!" Slowly I lifted her into the saddle, and stood by her side in silence because I could not speak.
"Hugh, kiss me once more!"
She stooped down and held a white, strained face close to mine. One clinging kiss I pressed upon her quivering lips, and then I drew aside. But as she rode away into the darkness, she called to me a wild sobbing cry which the wind clashed into my ears.
"Come back to me, Hugh, my love. You will come back to me," and scarce knowing what I did I answered her passionately—
"I will! I will!"
*****
We were together on H.M.S. Orontes, eastward bound, her father and I, but though we sat opposite one another at the Captain's table, we never spoke. Sometimes I caught him looking at me wistfully, and then I remembered that I had saved his life. But I wanted no thanks for it, and from him I would receive none.
"Queer lot those Devereux," I heard one of my brother officers remark, unconscious of my presence. "Uncle and nephew, and don't speak! Must be something wrong, I should think."
"Looks like it. If the Colonel hadn't written that tremendously clever book, I should think he was a bit cracked."