He stood before them dressed in a scarlet tunic and a white helmet; a red sash hung across him, and on his breast were medals. At sight of him the girl called Dorothy Oliphant changed countenance; all caught their breath. The aspect of the man carried them, indeed, back to the old, old time.
"Welcome home, Captain Heron," said Christine. "We have followed your campaign day by day."
"We are home again," the soldier replied, gravely. "Unfortunately, we have left a good many of our regiment behind."
"Behind? You mean--they--are--dead." Christine shuddered. The others shuddered. Even Captain Heron himself for a moment turned pale. But he was again in the Past, and the honor of his regiment was in his hands.
"You have fought with other men," said Christine. "Let me look in your face. Yes--it is changed. You have the look of the fighting man in the old pictures. You look as if you mean to have something, whatever it is, whether other men want it or not. Oh, you have fought with men! It is wonderful! Perhaps you have even killed men. Were you dreadfully afraid?"
"Oh!" Christine clapped her hands. "I wanted to see that look. It is the look of a man in sudden wrath. Forgive me! It is terrible to see a man thus moved. No, Captain Heron, no! I understand. An officer in your regiment could be afraid of nothing."
"I have seen a soldier," she said. Then she sprang to her feet. "Now," she cried, "it is our turn. Come with me, you ladies; and you, gentlemen, go into that room. For one night we will put on the dresses you used to wear. Come!"
They obeyed. There was nothing that they would not have done, so completely had she bewitched them. How long since they had been addressed as ladies and gentlemen!
"Come," she said, in the room whither she led the women, "look about, and choose what you please. But we must make haste."
There was a great pile of dainty dresses laid out for them to choose--dresses in silk and all kinds of delicate stuffs, with embroidery, lace, ribbons, jewels, chains, rings, bracelets, gloves, fans, shoes--everything that the folly of the past time required to make rich women seem as if they were not the same as their poorer sisters.
They turned over the dresses, and cried out with admiration. Then they hastened to tear off their ugly gray frocks, and began to dress.
