Ciudad Rodrigo and Almeida fall successively into their hands, and
retired, mystified and disappointed, to Torres Vedras.

Wounded in a somewhat scatter-brain night expedition to the lines of
Ciudad Rodrigo, my campaigning--for some time, at least--was concluded;
for my wound began to menace the loss of my arm, and I was ordered back
to Lisbon. Fred Power was the first man I saw, and almost the first
thing he told me was that Sir George Dashwood was in Lisbon, and that
his daughter was with him. And then, with conflicting feelings, I found
that all Lisbon mentioned my name in connection with the senhora, and
Sir George himself, in appointing me an aide-de-camp, threw increased
gloom over my thoughts by referring to the report Power had spoken of.
My torment was completed by meeting Miss Dashwood in the Senhora Inez's
house under circumstances which led to treat me with stiff, formal
courtesy.

The next night a letter from a Dublin friend reached me which told me
that "Hammersly had got his _congé_."

Here, then, was the solution of the whole chaos of mystery; here the
full explanation of what had puzzled my aching brain for many a night
long. His own were the letters I had delivered into Hammersly's hands. A
flood of light poured at once across all the dark passages of my
history; and Lucy, too--dare I think of her? What if she had really
cared for me! Oh, the bitter agony of that thought! To think that all my
hopes were shipwrecked with the very land in sight.

I sprang to my feet with some sudden impulse, but, as I did so, the
blood rushed madly to my head, and I fell. My arm was again broken, and
ere day I was delirious.