With nervous hands he replaced the picture with its face to the wall, and began to pace up and down the room, wondering if D’Arcambal would send for him.  He had hope of seeing Jeanne again that night.  He felt sure that she had gone to her room, and that even D’Arcambal might not know that he was alone.  In that event he had a long night ahead of him, filled with hours of sleeplessness and torment.  He waited for three-quarters of an hour, and then the idea came to him that he might discover some plausible excuse for seeking out his host.  He was about to act upon this mental suggestion when he heard a low rustling in the hall, followed by a distinct and yet timid knock.  It was not a man’s knock, and filled with the hope that Jeanne had returned, Philip hastened to the door and opened it.

He heard soft footsteps retreating rapidly down the hall, but the lights were out, and he could see nothing.  Something had fallen at his feet, and he bent down to pick it up.  The object was a small, square envelope; and re-entering his room he saw his own name written across it in Jeanne’s delicate hand.  His heart beat with hope as he opened the note.  What he read brought a gray pallor into his face: 

Monsieur Philip,—­If you cannot forget what I have done, please at least try to forgive me.  No woman in the world could value your love more than I, for circumstances have proven to me the strength and honor of the man who gives it.  And yet it is as impossible for me to accept it as it would be for me to give up Fort o’ God, my father, or my life, though I cannot tell you why.  And this, I know, you will not ask.  After what has happened to-night it will be impossible for me to see you again, and I must ask you, as one who values your friendship among the highest things in my life, to leave Fort o’ God.  No one must know what has passed between us.  You will go—­in the morning.  And with you there will always be my prayers.

Jeanne.

The paper dropped from between Philip’s fingers and fell to the floor.  Three or four times in his life Philip had received blows that had made him sick—­physical blows.  He felt now as though one of these blows had descended upon him, turning things black before his eyes.  He staggered to the big chair and dropped into it, staring at the bit of white paper on the floor.  If one had spoken to him he would not have heard.  Gregson, in these moments, might have laughed a little nervously, smoked innumerable cigarettes, and laid plans for a continuance of the battle to-morrow.  But Philip was a fighter of men, and not of women.  He had declared his love, he had laid open his soul to Jeanne, and to a heart like his own, simple in its language, boundless in its sincerity, this was all that could be done.  Jeanne’s refusal of his love was the end—­ for him.  He accepted his fate without argument.  In an instant he would have fought ten men—­a hundred, naked-handed, if such a fight would have given him a chance of winning Jeanne; he would have died, laughing, happy, if it had been in a struggle for her.  But Jeanne herself had dealt him the blow.