Are the wounds serious ones ?" "Nay, mere scratches of the flesh, to heal in a week.

Why did you waste your last shot on that savage who would have struck me?
It was not the will of De Noyan that it be expended thus." "You must have formed a poor conception of me, Geoffrey Benteen," she answered, as if my words pained her, "if you suppose I value my life more highly than your own.

But for my solicitation you would never have been in such stress, and, whatever else may be true, Eloise de Noyan is not one accustomed to deserting her friends." "Yet there are fates possible to a woman more to be dreaded than death." "Ay, and frontier bred, I know it well, yet none so bad as would have been the knowledge that I was guilty of ingratitude.

My life, my honor, are in the care of God, Geoffrey, and if I remain grateful for aught this day, it is that my shot proved timely, saving you from that blow.

Tell me, was it not a woman at whose command the combat ceased ?" "It was; a white woman at that, unless my eyes deceived me.