When the beautiful and mysterious nurse whose fame had gone up with the soldiers into Tilad Pass, arrived with others to take charge of the Red Cross hospital, on the day following the battle, she found the man she had been longing to see for many weary, heartsick months. She found him dying.

To the surprise of the enthralled command, she fell in a dead swoon when she looked upon the pallid face of Graydon Bansemer. She had gone eagerly from one pallet to another, coming upon his near the last. One glance was enough. His face had been in her mind for months—just as she was seeing it now; she had lived in the horror of finding him cold in death.

It was Teresa Velasquez who first understood. She knew that Bansemer's one woman had found him at last. Her heart leaped with hatred for one brief instant, then turned soft and contrite. If she had learned to care for the big American herself during the hard days when he had been so tender, she also had learned that her worship was hopeless. She had felt his yearning love for another; now she was looking upon that other. While the attendants were bending over their unconscious companion, the Spanish girl stood guard over the man who had been her guardian, the man whose life was going out before her miserable, exhausted eyes.

Jane Cable stirred with returning life; Teresa was quick to see that words not medicine would act as the restorative. She went swiftly to the American girl's side and, clasping her hands, cried sharply into her half conscious ears:

"He is not dead! He is alive! He needs you!"

The effect was magical. Life leaped into Jane's eyes, vigour into her body. She recovered from the swoon as mysteriously as she had succumbed to it. Her sudden breakdown had puzzled her companions. It is true that she was new in the service; she had seen but little of death and suffering; but, with all that, she was known to possess remarkable strength of purpose and fortitude. That she should collapse almost at the outset of her opportunities was the source of wonder and no little contempt among her fellow workers. The words of the strange girl in men's clothing opened the way to smart surmises. It was not long before everyone in the command knew that the "beautiful Red Cross nurse" was not wearing the garb of the vocation for the sake of humanity alone—in fact, it was soon understood that she did not care a straw for the rest of mankind so long as Graydon Bansemer needed her ministrations.

Ignoring the principles of the cause she served, she implored the doctors to confine their efforts to one man among all of them who suffered; she pleaded and stormed in turn, finally offering fabulous bribes in support of her demands. For the time being, she was half crazed with fear and dread, woefully unworthy of her station, partially divorced from reason.

The more desperately wounded were left in the village with an adequate guard, the rest of the command departing with Major March. A temporary hospital was established in the convent. There were two doctors and four or five nurses, with a dozen soldiers under command of Lieutenant Bray. It was while the apparently dead Bansemer was being moved to the improvised hospital that Jane presented herself, distraught with fear, to the young Southerner who had so plainly shown his love for her. She pleaded with him to start at once for Manila with the wounded, supporting her extraordinary request with the opinion that they could not receive proper care from the two young surgeons. Bray was surprised and distressed; he could not misunderstand her motive.

He had gone on caring for her without suspecting that there was or had been another man; she had not confided in him during those weary, pleasant months since they left San Francisco behind them. To learn the true situation so suddenly and unexpectedly stunned his sensibilities; he found difficulty in grasping the importance of the change an hour or two had made. He had fought valiantly, even exultantly, in the Pass that morning, her face ever before him, her words of praise the best spoils of the victory, should they win. He had come down to the village with joy and confidence in his heart, only to find that he was not, and could never be, anything to her, while the life or memory of this fallen comrade stood as a barrier.

Bray's hour following the discovery that she had deliberately sought out and found this stricken private was the most bitter in his life. His pride suffered a shock that appalled him; his unconscious egotism, born of hereditary conquests, revolted against the thought that his progress toward her heart was to be turned aside by the intervention of a common soldier in the ranks. Gentleman though he was, he could not subdue the feeling of exultation that came over him when she approached with her plea. He knew that it was a base sense of power that made him feel that he could punish his pride's offender by either denying or granting her appeal. The attitude of self-sacrifice appealed to his wounded vanity; he was tempted to profit by an exhibition of his own pain and generosity.

He went with her into the convent and to the pallet on which was stretched the long, still figure of Graydon Bansemer. A surgeon was standing near by, studying the grey face with thoughtful eyes. Bray's first glance at the suffering face sent a thrill of encouragement through his veins. The man was beyond all human help; the grip of death was already upon his heart.

Then, the true manhood that had been his, through all generations, revolted against the thought that was in his mind. The man should not die if it was in his power to prevent; no matter what the cost to him, he would give his aid to her and hers. He tried to put aside the feeling that death was certain—and very soon, at that; he sought honestly to justify himself in the hope that Bansemer's life could be saved, after all.

"Leave me alone with the doctor, Miss Cable," he said. She was kneeling beside the man on the cot. Without a word, but with a dark appealing look into the Virginian's eyes, she arose and went swiftly away. "What chance has this poor fellow, doctor?"

"None whatever, sir. He'll be dead in an hour. I'm sorry, on her account. Strange case. I've heard she belongs to a fine family in the East. Poor devil, he's got an awful hole in his side."

"Have you made a careful examination? Is it possible that no vital spot has been touched?"

"We haven't had time for a thorough examination; it was better not to waste the time on him when there were others whom we have a chance to save."

"You will oblige me, doctor, by giving him the quickest and most careful attention. There may be a chance. He is one of the bravest men in the army. Don't let him die if there is a chance for him. Miss—er—the nurse—has asked if he can be moved to-day."

"No. But wait; I don't see why, if it will satisfy her. He will die anyhow, so why not tell her that we will start south with him to-morrow?"

"It isn't fair. She should be told the truth."

"He'd die, that's all—any way you put it."

"You will make the examination?"

"Yes, in—at once."

"But you—you feel that it is hopeless?"

"Certainly, sir."

"I'm-I'm sorry," said Bray, walking away. The doctor looked after him with a queer expression in his eyes and then called his confrere to the pallet.

Bray found Jane waiting for him outside the door; Teresa Velasquez was standing beside her, holding her hand.

"What does he say?" cried Jane, grey with anguish.

"He cannot be moved. There is no—but little hope, Miss Cable. They are to make another examination."

"He must be saved! He must! Let me go to him now. I will help. I will give my life to save his," she cried. Bray stood between her and the door, his arms extended.

"Don't go in now, I implore. Wait! There may be good news."

"He is everything in the world to me!" she moaned.

"Come with me," whispered Teresa. Bray looked at the Spanish girl, and a new light broke in upon his understanding. What was this refugee to Bansemer? The answer shot into his brain like a flash and he turned cold.

"Miss Cable, I think I understand your anxiety," he said, his voice trembling. "Won't you let this young lady take you away for half an hour or—-"

"But I am a nurse! Why should I be kept from him? I am here to care for all of them," she protested.

"You are not fit to do duty just now," he said. "Miss Cable, I understand why you are here. It is noble of you. I am truly sorry that there is so little hope." He was leading her away from the building, leaving Teresa standing there with her eyes fastened upon the door with a look that could not be mistaken. "I would give my own life to have his spared for your sake, Jane. Forgive me. I would willingly give all I have in life for you. But I am afraid it is impossible to save him."

"Don't say that," she whispered.

"You—you would be his wife?" he asked.

"No, that cannot be. I COULD not be his wife."

"You mean—he is married?"

"No, no! not that. You can't understand. I can never marry him—never!"

Bray struggled for a moment with the puzzle; his eyes went slowly to Teresa. Then he suddenly understood why Jane Cable would not marry the man she had come to find. He asked no questions of himself, but Teresa would have been the result of every conjecture had he done so.

"He might better be dead," he thought, his eyes hardening. "She's found him out. Gad, I hope—-" but he put it from him.

Graydon Bansemer did not die within the hour, nor that day. The careful examination of the surgeons gave little additional hope; it did, however, reveal the fact that no vital organ had been destroyed or injured. The ball had torn a great hole in his left side and had gone through the body. Probing was not necessary. The flow of blood was frightful. There was a spark of life left on which to build a frail hope, and they worked with new interest.

The attention of everyone was directed to this tragic struggle; the efforts of all were lent to the successful end. Jane Cable, dogged and tireless, came to be his nurse, now that the life thread still held together. It is not the purpose of this narrative to dwell upon the wretched, harrowing scenes and incidents of the wilderness hospital. The misery of those who watched and waited for death; the dread and suffering of those who gave this anxiety; the glow of spiritual light which hovered above the forms of men who had forgotten their God until now.

The first night passed. There were sleepless eyes to keep company with the faint moans and the scent of chloroform. Over the figure of Graydon Bansemer hung the eager, tense face of Jane Cable. Her will and mind were raised against the hand of death; down in her soul she was crying! "You shall not die!" and he was living, living on in spite of death. The still, white face gave back no sign of life; a faint pulse and an almost imperceptible respiration told of the unbroken thread. Hoping against hope!

Dawn came, and night again, and still the almost breathless girl urged her will against the inevitable. She had not slept, nor had she eaten of the food they brought to her. Two persons, a soldier and a girl, stood back and marvelled at her endurance and devotion; the harassed surgeons, new in experience themselves, found time to minister to the seeming dead man, their interest not only attracted by his remarkable vitality but by the romance attached to his hope of living.

That night he moved, and a low moan came from his lips. The Goddess of Good Luck had turned her face from the rest of the world for a brief instant to smile upon this isolated supplicant for favour. Jane's eyes and ears had served her well at last; she caught the change in him and her will grasped the hope with more dogged tenacity than before. The word went out that there was a chance for him. Her vigil ended when Bray came to lead her away—ended because she dropped from exhaustion.

The next morning, after a dead sleep of hours, she returned to his side. The surgeon smiled and the nurse clasped her hands with tears in her eyes. Bansemer was breathing thickly and tossing in delirium. It was as if he had been lifted from the grave.

Lieutenant Bray was seated in front of the convent late that evening, moodily studying his own emotions. Teresa, still attired as she had been for weeks, hung about the chapel with the persistance of a friendless dog. He watched her and pitied her, even as he pitied himself for the wound he was nursing. What was to become of her? He called her to him.

"Senorita, they say he is better. Tell me, does it mean much to you?"

"Oh, senor, he has been noble and good and honourable. If he lives I shall always hold these weeks with him in absolute reverence."

"Then she does not understand?"

"She? What is there for her to understand? She loves him and he loves her. That is enough."

"She says she will not marry him. There must be a reason."

The girl's face darkened instantly and her breath came quickly.

"You—you think that I am the reason? Is it so? Because I am here in these hateful clothes? You would say that to me? How dare you!"

She burst out with tears of rage and shame and fled from his sight.

Jane came rapidly through the church door, out of the gloom and odour into the warm sunshine and the green glow of the world, her face bright, her eyes gleaming.

"He is conscious!" she cried. "He knows me!"