“I can,” said a voice which was not Haldane’s. “I can, Stephen.”
Stephen stared round the hut as if the evidence of his ears were totally untrustworthy. Haldane touched him on the shoulder with a smile.
“Come!” she said.
The next minute Stephen was kneeling beside Ermine, covering her hand with kisses, and pouring upon her all the sweetest and softest epithets which could be uttered.
“They are all gone, sweet heart,” he said, in answer to her earnest queries. “And the priests may say what they will, but I believe they are in Heaven.”
“But that other, Stephen? You said, me and one other. One of the men, I suppose?”
“That other,” said Stephen gently, “that other, dear, is Rudolph.”
“What can have become of him?”
“He may have strayed, or run into some cottage. That I cannot find him may mean that he is alive.”
“Or that he died early enough to be buried,” she said sadly.