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“You ride alone at night? But that must be very dangerous!”

“Dangerous? If I was afraid of danger, I should not be here.”

“But your life is so valuable. Has no one begged you to be prudent?”

“My officers used to preach to me, but I have broken them of it—all but the doctor. Poor Tarleton! he is a very faithful fellow. But will you think me quite mad, Miss Ross, if I tell you that there is another sound as well? It is as if the warder of a fortress should listen across a valley, and hear the tread of the sentry on the ramparts of a hostile fortress opposite. And the tread comes nearer.”

“Major Keeling, you frighten me. Who—what do you mean?”

He laughed. “Oh, the tread is a good thousand miles away yet. But it is coming nearer, all the same. Nominally it is stopped by the Araxes, but it is already pressing on to the Jaxartes. The Khanates will be absorbed, and then—will the two warders meet face to face then, I wonder? It may not be in my day, or even yours, but it will come.”

“You mean Scythia? But is she advancing? Why——?”