The sun was already high when Audrey awoke.  She started up, refreshed in body and mind.  Her first thought was of her husband.  No doubt he had gone out long before.  He always rose early, even when off duty.

Then she remembered Phil, and her face contracted as all the trouble of the night before rushed back upon her.  Was he still living? she wondered.

She stretched out her hand to ring for her ayah.  But as she did so her eyes fell upon a table by her side and she caught sight of an envelope lying there.  She picked it up.

It was addressed to herself in her husband’s handwriting, and, with a sharp sense of anxiety, she tore it open.  The note it contained was characteristically brief: 

I hope by the time you read this to have procured young Turner’s release, if he still lives—­at no very great cost, I beg you to believe.  I desire the letter that you will find on my writing-table to be sent at once to the colonel.  There is also a note for Mrs. Raleigh which I want you to deliver yourself.  God bless you, Audrey.

      E.T.

Audrey looked up from the letter with startled eyes and white cheeks.  What did it mean?  What had he been doing in the night while she slept?  How was it possible for him to have saved Phil?

Trembling, she sprang from her bed and began to dress.  Possibly the note to Mrs. Raleigh might explain the mystery.  She would ride round with it at once.

She went into Tudor’s room before starting and found the letter for the colonel.  It was addressed and sealed.  She gave it to a syce with orders to deliver it into the colonel’s own hands without delay.

Then, still quivering with an apprehension she would not own, she mounted and rode away to the surgeon’s bungalow.

Mrs. Raleigh received her with some surprise.

“Ah, come in!” she said kindly.  “I’m delighted to see you, dear; but, sure, you are riding very late.  And is there anything the matter?”

“Yes,” gasped Audrey breathlessly.  “I mean no, I hope not.  My husband has—­has gone to try to save Phil Turner; and—­and he left a note for you, which I was to deliver.  He went away in the night, but he—­of course he’ll—­be back—­soon!”

Her voice faltered and died away.  There was a look on Mrs. Raleigh’s face, hidden as it were behind her smile, that struck terror to Audrey’s heart.  She thrust out the letter in an anguish of unconcealed suspense.

“Read it!  Read it!” she implored, “and tell me what has happened—­quickly, for I—­I don’t understand!”

Mrs. Raleigh took the letter, passing a supporting arm around the girl’s quivering form.

“Sit down, dear!” she said tenderly.

Audrey obeyed, but her face was still raised in voiceless supplication as Mrs. Raleigh opened the letter.  The pause that followed was terrible to her.  She endured it in wrung silence, her hands fast gripped together.