"Great guns!" he exclaimed, eagerly, "but I know you. You're old man
Gillis's gal from Bethune, ain't ye?"
The quickly uplifted dark eyes seemed to lighten the ghastly pallor of
her face, and her lips trembled. "Yes," she acknowledged simply, "but
he's dead."
The lieutenant laid his ungloved hand softly on her shoulder, his blue
eyes moist with aroused feeling.
"Never mind, little girl," he said, with boyish sympathy. "I knew
Gillis, and, now the sergeant has spoken, I remember you quite well.
Thought all the time your face was familiar, but could n't quite decide
where I had seen you before. So poor old Gillis has gone, and you are
left all alone in the world! Well, he was an old soldier, could not
have hoped to live much longer anyway, and would rather go fighting at
the end. We 'll take you back with us to Bethune, and the ladies of
the garrison will look after you."
The recumbent figure lying a few yards away half lifted itself upon one
elbow, and Hampton's face, white and haggard, stared uncertainly across
the open space. For an instant his gaze dwelt upon the crossed sabres
shielding the gilded "7" on the front of the lieutenant's scouting hat,
then settled upon the face of the girl. With one hand pressed against
the grass he pushed himself slowly up until he sat fronting them, his
teeth clinched tight, his gray eyes gleaming feverishly in their sunken
sockets.
"I'll be damned if you will!" he said, hoarsely. "She 's my girl now."