"What is the word?"
"Consumption."
Ethan sat looking at him in silence. Val half rose. She must let them know she was there. But—consumption! She sank down. Was it true that was the ghost that haunted the Fort? Certainly it was true that she had never heard the word on the lips of her elders.
"My father and my wife died of it," John Gano was saying. "My mother has the old lingering form of it. It was 'galloping consumption' that carried my sister Valeria out of the world at thirty. I am dying of it. My children—"
A curious hoarse sound tore its way out of his throat, and he buried his head in his hands. When he looked up his eyes were wild and bright. Val held her breath, and the nails of her clinched hands dug into her palms.
"I have just one hope," her father said, "that my innocent children will go out as painlessly as may be, before the great battle begins."
Val drew back, crouching behind the chair-back with blanched face.
"It is too late to hope that," said Ethan.
"No, it's not too late; the enemy is still in ambush."