ungrateful. Years of war service make one careless of life, but I know
it was your shot that saved me. You are a brave girl."

Her overtaxed nerves gave way at my words, and I knew she was crying
softly. The sobbing was in her voice as she strove to speak.

"Oh, no, I am not; you do not guess how great a coward I am. I scarcely
knew what I was doing when I fired. That horrid thing--what was it?"

"A huge mastiff, I imagine; one of the largest of his breed. But
whatever it may have been, the beast is dead, and we have nothing more
to fear from him."

"Yet I tremble so," she confessed, almost hysterically. "Every shadow
frightens me."

I realized that no amount of conversation would quiet her nerves so
effectively as some positive action; besides, I felt the hot blood
constantly trickling down my arm, and realized that something needed to
be done at once to stanch its flow, before weakness should render me
equally useless.

"Do you think you could build a fire on the hearth yonder?" I asked. "I
am afraid I am hardly capable of helping you as yet; but we must have
light in this gloomy old hole, or it is bound to craze us both. Take
those broken chairs if you find nothing better."

She instantly did as I bade her, moving here and there about the room
until she gathered together the materials necessary, but keeping
carefully away from where the dead dog lay, until in a brief space of