Dismounted and breathless, Cigarette was by the side of Cecil, and had flung herself on his breast.
Her cry came too late; the volley was fired, and while the prisoner stood erect, grazed only by some of the balls, Cigarette fell, pierced and broken by the fire. She died in Cecil's arms, with the comrades she had loved around her.
It is spring. Cecil is Lord of Royallieu, the Lady Venetia is his bride.
"It was worth banishment to return," he murmured to her. "It was worth the trials that I bore to learn the love that I have known."
And the memories of both went back to a place in a desert land where the folds of the tricolour drooped over one little grave--a grave where the troops saluted as they passed it, because on the white stone there was carved a name that spoke to every heart:
CIGARETTE
ENFANT DE L'ARMÉE, SOLDAT DE LA FRANCE.