As for
thanks and reward I have had both; for you have done something worth
the doing, and you give me this."
She took up the broken blade as she spoke, and carried it away,
looking proud of her new trophy.
Fletcher left next day, saying, while he pressed her hand as warmly
as if the vigor of two had gone into his one:
"You will let me come and see you by and by when you too get your
discharge: won't you?"
"So gladly that you shall never again say you have no home. But you
must take care of yourself, or you will get the long discharge, and
we can't spare you yet," she answered warmly.
"No danger of that: the worthless ones are too often left to cumber
the earth; it is the precious ones who are taken," he said, thinking
of her as he looked into her tired face, and remembered all she had
done for him.
Christie shivered involuntarily at those ominous words, but only
said, "Good-by, Philip," as he went feebly away, leaning on his
servant's arm, while all the men touched their caps and wished the
Colonel a pleasant journey.
CHAPTER XVIII.
SUNRISE.
THREE months later the war seemed drawing toward an end, and
Christie was dreaming happy dreams of home and rest with David,
when, as she sat one day writing a letter full of good news to the
wife of a patient, a telegram was handed to her, and tearing it open
she read:
"Captain Sterling dangerously wounded.
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