Page:Harold Lamb--Marching Sands.djvu/240

 Sir Lionel?" A shadow passed over her expressive face. "I saw the attack on the caravan. Did he"

"Sir Lionel made his way back to me," said Gray, his voice gruff and tense. "He was the only survivor of the caravan."

"Then he is dead," she responded slowly. "Or he would have come with you." She bit her lip, bending her head, so that Gray should not see the tears in her eyes. "Oh, I have feared it. The Buddhist priests said that their guards would find and kill him. An old man of the Wusun who speaks Turki repeated it to me." Gray was glad that Mary was prepared, in a measure, for the death of her uncle. He had found the sight of her distress hard to bear. He turned away.

"Yes. Sir Lionel died—bravely."

She released his hands, and fumbled with a torn, little square of linen that had once been a handkerchief.

"Oh!"

Fearing that she would break down and weep, Gray would have left the room, but she checked him with a gesture. She looked up quietly, although the tears were still glistening on her eyelids.

"Please, Captain Gray! I've been so—lonely. You won't go away, just for a while?"

For a while? He would have remained at her