Some kind of similar abuse came in a torrent from my lips, too⁠—though I cannot remember the actual words⁠—as I cursed the man for his disobedience and tried to make the girl comfortable on the ground. But the clergyman was more practical. He was spreading his coat over her and dashing water on her face.

“It’s not Joan I’ve killed at any rate,” I heard him mutter as she turned and opened her eyes and smiled faintly up in his face. “I swear the bullet went straight.”

Joan stared at him; she was still dazed and bewildered, and still imagined herself with the companion of her trance. The strange lucidity of the somnambulist still hung over her brain and mind, though outwardly she appeared troubled and confused.

“Where has he gone to? He disappeared so suddenly, crying that he was hurt,” she asked, looking at her father as though she did not recognise him. “And if they’ve done anything to him⁠—they have done it to me too⁠—for he is more to me than⁠—”