'Yes: we are full cousins certainly,' admitted Shafto with charming frankness.
'Nothing more?'
'What the devil more should we be?' asked Shafto, coarsely, annoyed by her questions.
'Friends—you were almost brothers once—in the dear old Major's time.'
'We are not enemies; he chose some way to fortune, I suppose, when Fate gave me mine.'
'And you know not where he is?'
'No.'
'Nor what he has done with himself?'
'No—no—I tell you no!' exclaimed Shafto, maddened with annoyance by these persistent questions and her tearful interest in her lover.
'Poor Florian!' said the girl, sadly and sweetly, 'he has become a soldier, and is now in Zululand.'