Then a great pause, and light streamed round him, comforting him.
It seemed to him that he was lying helpless and still by falling water in a valley.

The water soothed him, and he fell asleep.

After a long time he waked, and dimly knew that a face, good to look at, was bending over him.

In a vague, far-off way he saw that it was Elise Malboir; but even as he saw, his eyes closed, the world dropped away, and he sank to sleep again.
It was no vision or delirium; for Elise had come.

She had knelt beside his bed, and given him drink, and smoothed his pillow; and once, when no one was in the tent, she stooped and kissed his hot dark lips, and whispered words that were not for his ears to hear, nor to be heard by any one of this world.