“What is it you fear from Philip?” she asked him, at last, when she had waited vainly for him to break the silence.  “You can remember him but ill if you think that there will be anything in his heart save joy when he shall know that you are living.  You little dream how dear your memory is to him—­”

He paused before her abruptly.

“Hush, hush! or you will kill me!  Why!—­three nights ago I fled the camp as men flee pestilence, because I saw his face in the light of the bivouac-fire and dreaded that he should so see mine!”

She gazed at him in troubled amaze; there was that in the passionate agitation of this man who had been serene through so much danger, and unmoved beneath so much disaster, that startled and bewildered her.

“You fled from Philip?  Ah! how you must wrong him!  What will it matter to him whether you be prince or trooper, wear a peer’s robes or a soldier’s uniform?  His friendship never yet was given to externals.  But—­why?—­that reminds me of your inheritance.  Do you know that lord Royallieu is dead?  That your younger brother bears the title, thinking you perished at Marseilles?  He was here with me yesterday; he has come to Algeria for the autumn.  Whatever your motive may have been to remain thus hidden from us all, you must claim your own rights now.  You must go back to all that is so justly yours.  Whatever your reason be to have borne with all the suffering and the indignity that have been your portion here, they will be ended now.”

Her beauty had never struck him as intensely as at this moment, when, in urging him to the demand of his rights, she so unconsciously tempted him to betray his brother and to forsake his word.  The indifference and the careless coldness that had to so many seemed impenetrable and unalterable in her were broken and had changed to the warmth of sympathy, of interest, of excitation.  There was a world of feeling in her face, of eloquence in her eyes, as she stooped slightly forward with the rich glow of the cashmeres about her, and the sun-gleam falling across her brow.  Pure, and proud, and noble in every thought, and pressing on him now what was the due of his birth and his heritage, she yet unwittingly tempted him with as deadly a power as though she were the vilest of her sex, seducing him downward to some infamous dishonor.

To do what she said would be but his actual right, and would open to him a future so fair that his heart grew sick with longing for it; and yet to yield, and to claim justice for himself, was forbidden him as utterly as though it were some murderous guilt.  He had promised never to sacrifice his brother; the promise held him like the fetters of a galley slave.

“Why do you not answer me?” she pursued, while she leaned nearer with wonder, and doubt, and a certain awakening dread shadowing the blue luster of her eyes that were bent so thoughtfully, so searchingly, upon him.  “Is it possible that you have heard of your inheritance, of your title and estates, and that you voluntarily remain a soldier here?  Lord Royallieu must yield them in the instant you prove your identity, and in that there could be no difficulty.  I remember you well now, and Philip, I am certain, will only need to see you once to—­”