Caroline stood there abashed, looking full in the face of the stranger, her cheeks covered with blushes.  Taking her by the hand, the colonel conducted her to his wife, who was sitting near the countess.

“See, Amelia,” said he; “this is the young lady who saved my life ten years ago, when she was only a child.”

“How can that be possible?” asked Caroline, in amazement.

“It must indeed appear incomprehensible to you,” answered the colonel, “but do you remember the hussar-officer that one day, after a battle, stood knocking at the door of your father’s house in Rebenheim?  Do you remember the cherries which you so kindly gave him?”

“Oh, was it you?” exclaimed Caroline, while her face beamed with a smile of recognition.  “Thank God you are alive!  But how I could have done anything toward saving your life I cannot understand.”

“In truth, it would be impossible for you to guess the great service you did me,” said he, “but my wife and daughters know it well; I wrote to them of it at once.  And I look upon it as one of the most remarkable occurrences of my life.”

“And one that I ought to remember better than any other event of the war,” said his lady, rising and affectionately embracing Caroline.

“Well,” said the countess, “neither I nor my husband ever heard the story.  Please give us a full account of it.”

“Oh, it is easily told,” said the colonel.  “Hungry and thirsty, I entered the house in which Caroline and her parents dwelt, and, to tell the plain truth, I begged for some bread and water.  They gave me a share of the best they had, and did not hesitate to do so, though their village and themselves were in the greatest distress.  Caroline robbed every bough on her cherry tree to refresh me.  Fine cherries they were—­the only ones, probably, in the whole country.  But the enemy did not give me time to eat them; I was obliged to depart in a hurry.  Caroline insisted, with the kindest hospitality, that I should take them with me, but that was no easy matter:  my horse had been shot under me the day before.  I took from my knapsack whatever articles I could in a hurry, and, thrusting them into my pockets, I fought on foot until a hussar gave me his horse.  All that I was worth was in my pockets, so that to make room for the cherries I was obliged to take the pocket-book out of my pocket and place it here beneath my vest.  The enemy, who had been driven back, made a feint of advancing on us, and I led down my hussars in gallant style.  But suddenly we found ourselves in front of a body of infantry concealed behind a hedge.  One of them fired at me, and the fellow had taken good aim, for the ball struck me here on the breast.  But it rebounded from the pocket-book; otherwise, I should have been shot through the body and fallen dead on the spot.  Tell me,” said he, in a tone of deep emotion; “was not that little child an instrument in the hand of God to save me from death?  Am I right or not when I give Caroline the credit, under God, of having saved my life?  Her must I thank that my Amelia is not a widow and my daughters orphans.”