The khitmutgar watched the start with grave, inscrutable eyes and finally turned back into the bungalow with the aloofness of a dweller in another sphere. The all-pervading Christmas cheer seemed to have gone to the sahibs' heads already. Perhaps he wondered in what condition they would return.

"I say, you don't mind?" said Noel coaxingly, as they drew ahead along the dusty road.

And Olga answered lightly, "I'm not going to mind anything or think of anything serious all day long."

He laughed. "I'm with you there. It's a jolly world, isn't it? And it's a shame to spoil it. As a matter of fact, I tried to get Peggy for a companion, but her mother wouldn't hear of it. I am too headlong and Peggy is too precious."

Olga laughed. "The Rajah was talking about a man-eating tiger at Khantali only the other day."

"Oh, yes, there is one too. But I'm afraid we are not very likely to come across him."

"Afraid! Do you want to then?"

Noel's eyes shone with enthusiasm. "I'm just aching to get a shot at one of these creatures. I've never so much as seen one in the wild yet. If the Rajah gets up an expedition I hope he'll take me along."

"He asked me if I would go," said Olga.

"Did he though? Very affable of him! I hope you said No!"

She laughed at his tone. "Well, yes, I did. But it was only because I didn't think I should like it."

"Not like a tiger-hunt!" ejaculated Noel.

She coloured a little. "Do you really like seeing things die?"

"Oh, that!" said Noel. "You're squeamish, are you? No, I'm never taken that way myself. That is in great part why I came here. I hoped—everyone thought—there was going to be some sort of shindy. But—I suppose it's the result of your clever little uncle's tactics—it seems to have fizzled out. Very satisfactory for him no doubt, but rather rough luck on us."

"Was there really any danger?" Olga asked.

"Oh, rather! The city was simply swarming with budmashes, and it was said that the priests had begun to preach a jehad against the British raj. Then there was a bomb found on the parade-ground one night, close under the fort. It would have blown a good many of us sky-high if it had exploded, and damaged the fort as well. Badgers was quite indignant. You see the fort has just been painted and generally smartened up in anticipation of General Bassett coming this way. He is expected on a tour of inspection in a few weeks, and we naturally want to look our best when the officer commanding the district is around. Hence the righteous wrath of Badgers!"

"I never heard of all this," said Olga, from whose ears the seething unrest of the State had been studiously kept by Nick.

"No?" said Noel. "Well, there's no chance now of any fun here. I'm pinning all my hopes on the possibility of a shine on the Frontier."

Olga looked at his brown, alert face with its restless Irish eyes, and understood. "You never think of the horrid part, do you?" she said.

He laughed, and flicked his whip at a wizened monkey-face that peered at them round the bole of a tree. "What do you mean by the horrid part?"

She hesitated.

He turned his gay face to her. "Do you mean the hardships or the actual fighting?"

She gave a little shudder. Even in that brilliant warmth of sunshine she was conscious of a sense of chill. "I mean—the killing," she said. "It seems to me one could never forget that. It—it's such a frightful responsibility."

"It's all part of the game," said Noel. "I couldn't kill a man on the sly. But when the chances of being killed oneself are equal—well, I don't see anything in it."

"I see." Olga was silent a moment; then, with a curious eagerness: "And was that what you were thinking of that night when you told Peggy that sometimes it was the only thing to do?" she asked. "Forgive my asking! But I've wondered often what you meant by that."

"Great Scott!" said Noel, with a frown of bewilderment. "What night? What were we talking about?"

She explained with a touch of embarrassment. "It was the night I arrived. Don't you remember I came upon you hearing her say her prayers?—in fact you were saying them with her. I liked you for doing that," she said simply.

"Thank you," said Noel with equal simplicity. "I remember now. The kiddie said something about it being wicked to kill people, didn't she?"

"Yes. And you said—it was just before I interrupted you—you said that sometimes it was the only thing to do."

Noel nodded. "I remember. Well, can't you imagine that? Don't you agree that when a man is fighting for his country, or in defence of someone, he is justified in slaying his enemies?"

Olga was frowning also, the old, troubled frown of perplexity. "Oh, of course, when you put it like that," she said; then put her hand to her head with a puzzled air. "But that wasn't quite what I meant."

"What did you mean?" said Noel.

She shook her head. "I don't quite know. It's difficult to express things. Whenever I try to discuss anything I always seem to lose the thread."

Noel grinned boyishly. "Good for me! You'd jolly soon floor me if you didn't. Look at that parroquet, I say! He flashes like an emerald, and see that imp of a monkey! He's actually daring to rebuke us for trespassing. I call this road a disgrace to the State, don't you? If I were the Rajah—by the way, the Rajah isn't coming, is he?"

Olga thought it possible. She knew he had been asked, but he had not returned any definite reply. She hoped he would be prevented.

"Oh, don't you like him?" said Noel. "I detest him myself. That's partly why I'm so keen on smashing his team to-morrow. He's a slippery customer, he and that wily old dog Kobad Shikan. They'd erupt, the two of them, if they dared and overwhelm us all. But—they daren't!" And Noel turned his face upwards, and laughed an exceeding British laugh.

"I wonder how you know these things," said Olga, watching him.

"What? I don't know 'em of course. I'm only assuming," said Noel. "I only play about on the surface, as it were, and draw my own conclusions as to the depths. It's quite a fascinating game, and nobody's any the worse or the wiser."

"And you think Kobad Shikan untrustworthy?" questioned Olga.

"My dear girl, could anyone with any sense whatever think him anything else? Could he have run the show for so many years if he had been anything less than a crafty old schemer? Oh, you bet he hasn't been Prime Minister and Lord High Treasurer all this time for nothing. What does Nick think of him?"

"Nick never discusses any of them." Olga was considerably astonished by these revelations. "I thought it was fairly plain sailing," she said.

"Did you though? Well, Nick is a genius, as everyone knows. He is probably in the thick of everything, and knows all that goes on. He'll be a C.S.I. before he's done."

"Oh, do you think so?" said Olga, with shining eyes.

"Rather! It's pretty evident. You wait till old Reggie comes along, and ask him. He is a great backer of Nick's. So am I," said Noel modestly. "I'd back him against all the Kobad Shikans in the Empire."

This, as Noel had doubtless foreseen, proved a fruitful topic of conversation and lasted them during a considerable part of their drive. Nearly the whole of the way lay through the jungle, here and there narrowing to little more than a track over which great forest-trees stretched their boughs. It was all new country to Olga, and the quiet, sunless depths as they advanced, held her awe-struck, spellbound. She gazed into the thick undergrowth with half-fearful curiosity. Once, at a sudden loud flapping of wings, she started and changed colour.

"There must be so many wild things there," she said.

"Teeming with 'em," said Noel. "We've come along at a rattling pace. Shall we pull up and wait for the rest to turn up?"

But Olga did not want to linger on the jungle-road. "Besides we've got most of the provisions," she pointed out. "And I want to get things arranged a little before anyone comes."

They pressed on, therefore, past glades, obscure and gloomy, where the flying-foxes hung in branches from the trees, and the little striped squirrels leaped and scuttled from bough to bough, where the blue jays laughed with abandoned mirth and the parroquets squabbled unceasingly, and cunning monkey-faces peered forth, grimaced, and vanished.

"This place is full of critics," declared Noel. "Can't you feel the nasty remarks they're making?"

Olga laughed and slightly shivered. "It isn't a very genial atmosphere, is it? But I think we must be nearly there. Doesn't that look like a break in the trees ahead?"

She was right. They were coming to a clearing in the jungle. Gradually it opened before them. The trees gave place to shrubs, and the shrubs to tall kutcha-grass which Olga viewed with deep suspicion.

"How easily a tiger could hide there!" she said.

Noel laughed aloud. "I daresay the brute's a myth, but in any case they never come out in the day-time. Are you really nervous, or only pretending?"

She was not pretending, but she did not tell him so. The kutcha-grass was very thick, quite impenetrable. It stretched like a solid wall on each side of them for a considerable distance—a choked wilderness of coarse weed that grew higher than their heads.

"I say, what a charming spot!" said Noel. "Did Nick choose it for the scenery, do you think, or the excellence of the road?"

They were bumping in and out of dusty holes with a violence that threatened repeatedly to overturn them altogether.

Olga laughed rather hysterically. "I'm sure the champagne will be quite unmanageable after all this shaking up. And just look what a lather your horse is in!"

"It's a case of the wicked uncle and the lost babes over again," declared Noel. "It also smacks of The Pilgrim's Progress. Old Bunyan would have made some good copy out of this. He'd have dubbed you Mistress Timorous and me Master Overbold."

Olga laughed again more naturally. Noel could be very wholesome and reassuring when he liked.

"And this beastly jungle-grass," he proceeded, "is the Wilderness of Nasty Possibilities. Hold up, Tinker, my lad, and get out of it as fast as you can!"

Tinker was obviously most anxious to comply. He bent all his sweating energies to the task. The road—if such it could be called—bent in a wide curve through the high grass. As they gradually rounded this, it became evident that that stage of the journey was nearly over. The thick walls opened out. They had a glimpse of wider country ahead dotted with mango-trees.

"Hooray!" sang out Noel. "We return to civilization!"

But it was not a very populous civilization which they were approaching. They came within view of a domed temple indeed, but it was a temple set among ruins. There was no sign of any inhabitant, near or far.

"There's a well somewhere," said Olga. "Nick said we were to camp there."

"So be it!" said Noel. "It's Nick's funeral. Let us find his precious well!"

They emerged from the jungle-road with relief, and approached a group of mango-trees. These led in a somewhat broken grove to the temple which stood amidst stunted palms and cypresses. The mid-day sun was fierce, and the shade of the mangoes was welcome. For about a hundred yards they travelled over a road that was nearly choked by stones and grass, and then somewhat unexpectedly they discovered the well.

It was plainly very ancient, its round stone mouth crumbling with age. All about it and over its edges grew the coarse grass. It must have been many years since native women had foregathered there to discuss the affairs of forgotten Khantali. Above it, on rising ground, stood the temple, domed, mysterious, deserted.

"A place for satyrs to dance in, what?" suggested Noel. "We ought to have come here by moonlight. Let's get down and investigate. The others can't be far behind."

"Yes, let us fix on a place before they come!" said Olga. "It will save such a lot of discussion."

"Excellent notion! I'll tie up Tinker to one of these trees. I don't call this a very promising site for a bean-feast," said Noel, wrinkling his nose. "It's so beastly stuffy."

"Yes, we will try the temple first," said Olga. "It stands higher. There will be much more air there."

They descended. There was still no sign of the rest of the party. "I expect they gave us a start to keep out of the beastly dust," said Noel. "They'll be here directly. Nick has pitched on a secluded corner anyhow. I shouldn't think the foot of man had trodden it for a thousand years."

Olga laughed. "I wonder. It's better than the jungle, isn't it? I don't feel nearly so creepy here."

"What price tigers?" grinned Noel.

"Oh, I've got over that," she declared. "But I didn't like your Wilderness of Nasty Possibilities."

He flashed her a merry look. "You ought not to be afraid with Master Overbold by your side. As for the tiger, we may meet him yet."

"Oh, no, we shan't!" she asserted with confidence. "It would be too ludicrously like a fairy-tale."

"Horribly ludicrous!" said Noel. "Well, come along and look for him!"

So side by side they started.



CHAPTER VIII

THE SOUL OF A HERO

The way was exceedingly rough and here and there almost overgrown with coarse weeds. Near the temple, the ground ascended fairly steeply, and the path narrowed so that it was impossible to walk abreast.

"Wonder if there are any of those jolly little karaits about," speculated Noel. "If you don't mind, I'll go first."

"I believe I saw a scorpion!" said Olga, as he took the lead.

He laughed at her over his shoulder. "Or a lizard! Stick to it, Mistress Timorous! You'll develop a taste for adventure soon."

"Oh, I'm not a coward really," she protested. "At least I never used to be!"

"You are the sweetest girl in the world," said Noel, in a tone that reduced Olga to instant and uncompromising silence.

She could not refuse his hand, however, when he paused to help her over the rough places. It was an utter impossibility to be ungracious to Noel for long. He was far too seductive.

They reached the top of the ascent and found themselves close to the temple. The place was a ruin. Blocks of stone, that once had been part of its structure, were scattered in all directions; and, advancing, they presently stumbled upon the monstrous head of a broken idol.

"This is the temple of Dagon," said Noel dramatically. "I don't think it's a very suitable place for a picnic. One might find bits of human sacrifices about and that would spoil the appetite."

"Oh, don't be gruesome!" Olga besought him. "Let's go in, as we are here."

They crossed the stone-strewn space through the shadowy cypresses, and entered under the dome. The place was dark and very eerie. Their footsteps echoed weirdly, and instantly there ensued a wild commotion overhead of owls and flying-foxes.

Olga started violently, and Noel looked upwards with a laugh that echoed and echoed in sinister repetition.

"What a ghastly place!" whispered Olga, as it died away at last.

The whisper was taken up and repeated from wall to wall till the further darkness swallowed it. Olga's hand went out instinctively and closed upon Noel's arm. Her nerves were not strung to this.

Almost before she knew it, he had drawn her to him, and slipped the arm about her. She looked up swiftly to protest, but the words were never spoken. They died upon her lips. For even as she opened them to speak there came an awful sound from the darkness.

It began deep and low, swelling in volume till it filled the building, reverberating from stone to stone, vibrating along the broken floor—a growl rising to a furious snarl—the unmistakable voice of an angry beast.

Olga stood as one petrified, feeling the arm around her tighten to a grip, but too lost in horror to take any note thereof. Staring widely into the darkness before them, she saw two points of light, red, ominous, advancing as it were by swift stealth out of the deep shadow.

At the same moment, Noel by a sudden, wholly unexpected movement thrust her behind him.

"Go!" he said. "Go for your life! Get back to Tinker and warn the rest! I'll keep the brute from following you."

His voice was short and authoritative; it held compulsion. In that moment of emergency he was a boy no longer, but a man, cool and strong and undismayed—a man to command obedience.

"Go quickly!" he said. "Remember it's up to you to warn them. This other is my job. Good-bye!"

He spoke without turning his head; yet the very brevity of his speech seemed to give her strength. Mechanically, she moved to obey.

Later she never remembered passing out of that place of horror. She went, hardly knowing what she did. The sudden smiting of the sunshine between the cypress boughs was the first she knew of having left the temple behind her. As one stricken blind, she moved, too stunned for panic.

And then—how it happened she was utterly unable to realize—as if he had dropped from the sky a man stood suddenly in her path.

He wore a pith helmet dragged forward over his eyes, and she was too dazzled by the sun to see his face. But there was something—something in his gait, his figure, his attitude—that sent a wild thrill through her, waking her to vivid, pulsing life. With an incoherent cry she clutched him by the arm.

"The tiger!" she gasped. "The tiger!"

"Where?" he said.

She pointed back over her shoulder, her eyes dilated, anguished. "In the temple,—and Noel is there! He will be killed!"

In a single movement he had freed his arm and was gone. She heard his feet racing over the stones, and she turned up her face to the blinding sunshine and frantically prayed....

Minutes—or could it have been only seconds?—passed. From below her came Tinker's frightened neigh. She could hear him stamping in the undergrowth. But she had no further thought of going to him. That spot with all its terrors held her chained.

Suddenly from behind her there came a loud report—a nerve-shattering sound. She whizzed round. He had a gun, then. She had not seen that he had a gun.

But what had happened? What? What? She was trembling so that she could barely stand, yet she forced her quaking limbs to move. Back she stumbled, back through the glaring sunlight. Once she fell, and saw a lizard—or was it a scorpion?—flick from her path. And then she was up again, panting, sobbing, utterly unnerved, but struggling with all her failing strength to reach the ruined temple, to see for herself what lay there.

An awful silence brooded across the stony space. It was as though a curse had fallen upon it. She tried to lift her voice, to call to Noel, to make some sound in the stillness. But her throat was powerless.

She thought he must be dead. She thought that her brain had tricked her, that she had only dreamed of the coming of the second man, had dreamed of the gun-shot, had dreamed all but those dreadful gleaming eyes coming stealthily nearer and nearer out of the dark.

Again she tried to call, and again piteously she failed. She reached the temple staggering, her hands stretched gropingly before her. And even as she did so, the silence was rent by a sound that convinced her wholly that she was indeed dreaming—a sound that echoed and echoed through the gloom, making her pulses leap again in spite of her—the sound of a ringing British laugh.

She fell against the broken marble of the doorway, her hands pressed fast over her face. She was struggling with herself, consciously striving to nerve herself to go in and find his dead body. Of any personal danger she was past thinking. Had the tawny body of their enemy sprung out upon her then she would scarcely have known fear.

And so when Noel came suddenly to her, caught her hands into his own, making her look up, his brown face bent close to hers, she simply gazed at him uncomprehendingly, not believing that she saw him.

Swift concern flashed into his eyes. He drew her to him and held her in his arms. "Olga,—Olga dear, don't you know me?" he said. "You've had a beastly fright, haven't you? But the brute's dead, and no one else is any the worse. There, there! It's all right. Did you think I was killed and eaten?"

He was holding her closely now. His voice came softly, on a winning note of tenderness, into her ear. "And would you have cared—would you have cared—darling—if I had been?"

But she leaned against him quivering and speechless, unresisting, unresponding.

He held her for a space in silence, patting her shoulder reassuringly. But it was not in him to be silent for long. After a few seconds he was speaking again with cheery confidence.

"Let's get out of this ghastly place! The rest of the party must be coming along now. It was a nasty experience, wasn't it? But you're getting better, eh? That chap with the gun came up just in time to save my bacon. You saw him, didn't you?"

"Yes," she whispered feebly.

His arms relaxed a little. He looked down into her face. "Better now?"

With an effort she answered him. "Yes,—getting better."

"Can you walk?" he said. "Or shall I carry you?"

That roused her somewhat. "Oh, let me walk!" she said; and, after a moment: "Forgive me for being foolish! It—it was the shock. I shall be all right now. Just let me hold your arm."

He gave it, still looking at her in a fashion which she was at no loss to understand. Instinctively she sought to divert his attention. "Tell me what happened! Who—who was the man with the gun?"

His expression changed a little. A momentary shadow crossed his face. He answered her with a touch of restraint. "Oh, he's a fellow I've met before. You'll see him again, I daresay. He has been chasing around after this infernal tiger since early morning. Had a shot at the brute once and wounded him. Been hunting for him ever since."

"All alone?" asked Olga in amazement.

Noel nodded. "Cracked thing to do, but as he's bagged his game I suppose he'll do it again."

"And what is he doing now?" asked Olga, as they descended the narrow path.

"Oh, he was going to clear out. He was awfully disgusted that the skin wasn't worth having. And there wasn't much of the head left." Noel made a face. "I shouldn't advise any of our picnic party to go near that beastly temple. It's a deal too sacrificial just now. Hullo! Here come some of 'em at last! You'll be glad to get back under Nick's wing."

He smiled at her quizzically, and Olga smiled back reassured. But reaching the lower ground, she detained him for an instant.

"Noel," she said rather haltingly, "there are some things beyond words, and—and I think this is one of them. But I shall never forget what you did. It—it was—magnificent."

"Great Scotland!" said Noel. He spoke banteringly, but she could not meet his eyes. "And you think I could have done anything else?"

She smiled rather wistfully. "Not you—perhaps," she said. "But it was fine of you all the same."

"And you're—not sorry—I wasn't eaten?" he suggested.

She gave him her hand with a gesture half-appealing. "We won't talk about it," she said. "It just won't bear talking about."

Her voice trembled a little but she was plainly anxious that he should not notice it. He stood a moment silent, holding her hand. From the direction of the jungle-road there came the sounds of the approaching party—the rattle of hoofs and jingle of bells mingling with laughing voices and gay shouts. It seemed incredible that a bare ten minutes had elapsed since their own arrival upon the scene.

Noel's hand tightened a little upon hers. He bent with a certain serious gallantry that became him well, and carried it to his lips.

"My lady's wishes shall be obeyed always," he said gravely.

She knew that he meant her to ascribe a full meaning to his words. And she let herself be reassured, for that she knew him now to possess the soul of a hero.



CHAPTER IX

THE MAN WITH THE GUN

In after-days when Olga looked back upon the rest of that Christmas picnic, she could remember very little in detail of what took place. Her mind was so fully occupied with the adventure in the ruined temple that the events immediately following it made but a slight impression upon her.

That they lunched at length by the ancient well, that Nick and the Musgraves petted and made much of her, that Noel considerately amused himself with the care and entertainment of Peggy, all these things she was able afterwards vaguely to recall, but none of them remained vividly in her memory.

During the afternoon she rested, with Daisy sitting by her side and Nick smoking a few yards away, until presently the Rajah rode up unescorted and occupied Nick's attention for the remainder of the time. He came and shook hands with Olga later and congratulated her on her escape, but his manner seemed to her perfunctory and somewhat absent. Remembering Noel's words, she wondered what schemes were developing behind those dusky eyes.

Her thoughts, however, did not dwell on him; they were curiously active in another direction. Over and over again she saw herself stumbling over the stones under the cypresses and finding herself all-suddenly face to face with a man in a pith helmet. She was haunted by the thought of him, though she had not in the glare discerned him fully. She had seen him as one sees a shadow on a sheet, a momentary impression, suggestive but wholly elusive, capable of stirring her to the depths but yet too vague to grasp.

Even to her own secret heart she could not account for the wild suspicion to which that lightning glimpse had given birth. The man was probably a very ordinary Briton under ordinary circumstances. That he had a breadth of shoulder that imparted the impression of power and somewhat discounted his height, that his first appearance had been so leisurely that he might have been strolling in an English garden—the sauntering vision flashed across her as she had often seen it, hands deep in pockets, and stubby brier-pipe between his teeth—that his brevity of speech had impelled her to clearness of brain and prompt reply—all these were but incidents that might have characterized the coming of any stranger. And yet whenever she recalled any one of these details, she found her heart beating up against her throat as though it would choke her.

And why had he disappeared so suddenly, this stranger with the gun? How she wished she had had the presence of mind to turn back into the temple to find him! Why had Noel spoken of him with such evident restraint? Had he been under orders so to speak? She almost resolved to ask him, but realized immediately that for some reason she could not. Besides, had he not said she would see him again? And when she saw him—when she saw him—again she had to still the tumult of her heart—doubtless she would tell herself how utterly unreasonable her agitation concerning him had been. She would make the acquaintance of a total stranger and wonder how he had ever reminded her of the one man in her world who alone had had the power to move her thus.

So, over and over again she reassured herself, considering the matter and dismissing it, only to admit it over and over again for further consideration.

Nick made unflattering comment upon her jaded appearance when the time came to return, and bundled her unceremoniously into the Musgraves' dog-cart before Noel could put in a claim. Olga was in some sense relieved, for she did not want to talk, and Daisy fully understood and left her in peace during the drive back to Sharapura.

The brief twilight came upon them just before they reached their destination, and when they stopped before the bungalow it was nearly dark. The stately khitmutgar was waiting for them, and helped Olga to descend. He stood by with massive patience while the Musgraves bade her farewell and drove away; then with extreme dignity he addressed her.

"There is a strange sahib in the drawing-room, who waits to see the Miss sahib," he said.

Olga's heart gave a wild bound. "To see me? What name, Kasur?"

"Miss sahib, he gave no name. 'She knows me,' he said. 'I will announce myself.'"

Olga turned to the verandah steps, as if drawn thereto by some unseen magnetic force. Sedately Kasur followed.

"Will the Miss sahib await the return of Ratcliffe sahib?" he suggested decorously.

She turned at the head of the steps. Her eyes were alight, feverish. She was strung to so high a pitch of excitement that she scarcely knew what she did.

"No, I can't wait," she threw back to him. "But Ratcliffe sahib will be in directly. Tell him when he comes." And with that she was gone, running swiftly, as one who obeys an urgent call.

The lamps were alight in the drawing-room and the glare streamed out across the verandah. It dazzled her as she entered, but yet she did not pause. Not till that moment did she realize how great a void the absence of one man had made in her life. Not till that moment did she understand the reason of the crushing sense of loss which for so long had been with her. Perhaps she did not fully understand it then, but there was no hiding the sudden rapture of gladness at her heart. It pierced her almost with a sense of pain, and with it came a stabbing certainty that this was no new thing—that sometime, somewhere, she had felt it all before.

He was on his feet lounging against the mantelpiece as she entered, but he straightened himself to meet her, and dazzled though she was, she saw his outstretched hand.

As it closed upon her own, she found her voice, though panting between tears and laughter. "Max! You—you!"

"A happy Christmas to you!" said Max.

He grasped her hand very firmly. How well she remembered that strong restraining grip! How often had she felt the controlling magic of it! Once she had even hotly resented it; but to-day—to-day—

She saw his mouth go up at one corner in the old, quizzing way. "'If my heart by signs can tell—'" he began, and ended, openly smiling, "I should almost dare to fancy you were—well, shall we say not annoyed?—to see me."

"Annoyed!" she laughed, still struggling with an outrageous desire to cry.

He looked at her critically. "You haven't grown any plumper since I saw you last, fair lady. Do you live on air in these parts? You will be flattered to hear that your resemblance to the great Nick is more pronounced than ever. Where is he, by the way? I hope he hasn't been eaten by a tiger, though I scarcely think any tiger, would be such a fool as to expect to find any nourishment in him."

"Oh, don't be horrid!" she said, laughing more naturally. "That's too gruesome a joke after what happened this afternoon."

"I wasn't joking," said Max. "I'm a serious-minded person. And what did happen this afternoon—if it isn't indiscreet to ask?"

She raised her eyes to his in astonishment. "But you were there!" she said.

"Who told you so?" demanded Max.

"I saw you myself, I spoke to you. I told you about—about Noel being in the temple—with the tiger." She halted a little over the explanation.

Max smiled at her—a curious smile that seemed to express relief. "I didn't think you recognized me in a helmet," he said. "Yes, I was there. I'd been on the brute's track since daybreak. I'm told that it's the proper thing to let natives do all the stalking in this country. But to my mind that's half the fun. Gives the tiger a sporting chance, too."

"You were actually hunting it all by yourself!" said Olga, with a quick shudder.

Her hand still lay in his; he gave it a sudden sharp squeeze. "Don't shiver like that! It's a sign of too vivid an imagination. Yes, I was all on my own, and enjoyed it. It was my first tiger too. I've learned quite a lot about the Indian jungle to-day. What made Nick choose the haunts of a man-eater for his Christmas party? Was it one of his little jokes?"

"We didn't believe in the man-eater," said Olga, beginning to make subtle efforts to recover possession of her hand. "There hadn't been one so near for years, and Nick said he thought it was bunkum."

"There," said Max, "he did not display his usual shrewdness of intelligence. Where is the little god by the way?"

"He's following on with Noel. They stopped behind to finish packing."

Max's fingers closed more firmly upon hers, so that without open resistance she could not free herself. "Noel seems to have developed into quite a picturesque cavalier," he observed impersonally.

He was watching her, she knew; and over her face there ran a great wave of colour. She was furiously aware of it even before she saw his faint smile. Desperately she sought to turn the subject.

"Why didn't you come back to us when the tiger was dead?" she said. "Why didn't you let Noel tell me you were there?"

She caught the old glint of mockery in his eyes as he made reply. "As you have foreseen, fair lady," he observed, "one answer will suffice for both questions. It was not my turn just then. Moreover, you knew I was there."

"I wasn't absolutely sure," she protested quickly. "I thought it probable that I had made a mistake."

"Didn't you expect to see me?" he asked her coolly.

She stared at him. "How could I? I never dreamed of your being in India."

He passed the question by. "And yet you were the only person in India whom I took the trouble to inform of my arrival."

Her eyes widened. "What can you mean?"

"Didn't you get a message from me this morning?" he asked.

"From you?" she said incredulously.

"I sent you a message," said Max.

Her hand leaped suddenly in his. So that was the explanation! She began to tremble. "I—didn't understand," she said piteously.

She wished he would turn his eyes from her face, but he kept them fixed upon her. "I wonder who got the credit for it," he said.

She turned from his scrutiny in quivering silence. But her hand remained in his.

He took her gently by the shoulder. "Olga, tell me!" he said.

"I didn't know it came from you," she whispered.

"Why not? I wrote a line with it."

"Yes, but—but—"

"But—" said Max, with quiet insistence.

She tried to laugh. "It was very absurd of me. The initials weren't very clear. I thought they were—someone else's."

"Noel's?" he said.

She nodded.

There was a brief silence, during which she dared not look round. Then he spoke, his voice drily humorous. "I suppose you thanked him for it then?"

"No, I didn't," she said. "At least—at least—I was vexed, but I didn't want to hurt his feelings."

"No?" said Max, in the same cynical tone.

Her hand slipped free at last. She spoke more firmly. "I told him I couldn't accept it."

"Poor Noel!" observed Max. He took his hand from her shoulder also, and she knew that he thrust it into his pocket. "And what did he say to that?"

She hesitated. "Well, of course he—he explained—that he hadn't sent it."

"And you believed him?"

"Of course I did. He—we thought perhaps it was a hoax."

Max grunted; she wondered if he were seriously displeased. And then abruptly he turned her thoughts in another direction. "Well, now that you know the truth,—what are you going to do about it?"

The question came with the utmost coolness, but yet in some fashion it sounded like a challenge. She felt compelled to turn and face him.

Thick-set and British, he confronted her. "Before you decide," he said, "there's just one little thing I should like you to remember. You may not have been in love with me—I don't think you were; but you engaged yourself to me quite a long time ago."

Olga's hands were locked together. But she met the challenge unflinching, unafraid. Quite suddenly she knew how to answer it. Yet she waited, not answering, her pale eyes shining, her whole being strung to throbbing expectation.

He came a step nearer to her, looking at her very intently. "Well?" he said.

She made a little fluttering movement with her clasped hands. Her face was raised unfalteringly to his. "I haven't forgotten," she said.

"But you thought I had," said Max.

Her lips quivered. "So many things have happened since then," she said, in a low voice.

"What of that?" he said, and suddenly there was a deep note in his voice that she had never heard before. "Do you think that so long as the world holds us both I would be content without you?"

The words were few, but they thrilled her as never had she been thrilled before. There came again to her that breathless feeling as though an immense wave had suddenly burst over her. She raised her face gasping, half-frightened. She even had a wild impulse to turn and flee.

But it was gone on the instant, for very suddenly Max Wyndham's arms closed about her, holding her fast, and she had no choice but to surrender. With a sob she yielded herself to him, clinging very tightly, her face hidden with a desperate shyness against his shoulder.

He spoke no word of love, simply holding her in silence during those first great moments. But at length his hand came up and lay quietly, reassuringly, upon her head. She quivered under it for a little. He waited till she was still.

"Olga," he said then, speaking very softly, "will you tell me something?"

"Perhaps," she whispered back.

"Why are you afraid of me? You never used to be."

She clung a little closer to him and was silent.

"Don't you know?" he said.

"Not altogether." Tremulously she made answer.

"I've had a feeling—all this time—that you were angry with me for some reason."

"For what reason?" he said.

"That's what I never could remember."

The hand upon her head moved and lightly stroked her cheek; then very gently but with evident determination turned her face upwards. His eyes, green and piercing, looked straight into her soul.

"You think that still?" he asked.

"No." Panting, she answered him; for deep within her, memory stirred afresh. The phantom of her dread lurked once more darkly in the background. The last time those eyes had searched her thus, her soul had been in agony. Wherefore? Wherefore? She struggled to remember.

And then in a flash all was gone. The past went from her. She was back again in the present, with the throbbing consciousness of Max's arms enfolding her, and the overwhelming knowledge that Max loved her filling all her world.

"You're not afraid now," he said.

"No," she answered softly.

"Then—" he set her free, bending to her, his face close to hers—"I may go on 'breathing and hoping,' may I, without running any risk of scaring you away?"

She laughed—a faint, sweet laugh more eloquent than words, realizing fully that, albeit her defences were down, he would not enter her citadel until she gave him leave.

His chivalrous regard for her went straight to her heart. In Noel it would not have surprised her, but in Max it was so unexpected that for a moment she hardly knew how to meet it.

He waited with the utmost patience, his smile, subtly softened but still unmistakably humorous, hovering at the corner of his mouth.

And so after a moment, half-laughing, with a face on fire, she reached out, took the red head between her hands, and bestowed a very small, shy kiss upon his cheek.

The next instant he held her crushed against his heart while his lips pressed hers with all the fiery passion of a man's worship....

It must have been several minutes later that a cracked voice was suddenly uplifted in the verandah singing a plantation love-song with more of pathos than tunefulness.

Olga started at the sound, started violently and guiltily, and slipped out of reach with a scarlet countenance.

"Nick!" she whispered.

Max glanced at the open window, raised his brows, shrugged his shoulders, and strolled across to it. Nick it was, stationed at a discreet distance, but dimly discernible in the darkness.

"Let me go to him first!" murmured Olga.

She passed Max with a touch of the hand and a fleeting smile, and was gone.

Nick's plaintive lament came to an abrupt conclusion two seconds later, and Max turned back into the room with his hands thrust deep in his pockets, and one side of his mouth cocked at an angle expressive of extreme satisfaction. He had dared a good deal that day, far more than Olga vaguely dreamed, and events had proved him more than justified.



CHAPTER X

A TALK IN THE OPEN

Noel dined with the Musgraves that night. His mood was hilarious throughout, but he seemed for some reason unwilling to discuss the adventure he had shared with Olga in the temple, and of their rescuer he scarcely spoke at all. He seemed in fact to have practically dismissed the whole matter from his mind, and when he bade them farewell at the end of the evening Daisy acknowledged to her husband that she was disappointed.

"I felt so sure he had begun to care for Olga," she said. "He doesn't often miss his opportunities, that boy."

"Perhaps Olga doesn't chance to care for him," suggested Will, with his arm round his wife's waist. "That does happen sometimes, you know."

She smiled, her cheek against his shoulder. "I can't imagine any girl resisting Noel's charms if he were the first comer—as I fancy he must be," she said.

"I wonder if he is," said Will. "She told me the other night she had never been in love, but she seemed to know so much about the disease that I rather doubted her veracity."

"Fancy your living to call it a disease!" said Daisy, with a faint sigh.

He stooped and kissed her. "Oh, I'm not a cynic, my dear," he said. "Shall we call it an incurable affection of the heart instead?"

"That's almost as bad," she protested.

"I said incurable," pleaded Will. "I ought to know, for I fell a victim to it long ago."

She laughed softly against his shoulder. "Well, if you will have it so, it's very infectious, you know. And I am a victim too."

His arm tightened. "Mine was always a hopeless case, Daisy," he murmured half wistfully.

She turned her lips up to his. "When it attacks old folks—like you and me, dear—it always is," she said.

He kissed her again, lingeringly and in silence. There had been a time of which neither ever spoke when Will's love for his wife had been to her a thing of little value. He had not been the first comer. That time had passed long since, and with it the last of their youth. But though for them romance was no more, they had become lovers in a sense more true. Their lives were bound up together and woven into one by the Loom of God.

Whatever opportunities Noel might have missed that day, he certainly did not permit the thought of them to depress him. With his customary jauntiness, he took his departure; but he did not return straight to his quarters at the cantonments. He turned his steps in the direction of the dak-bungalow, whistling in the starlight as he went.

A chilly wind was blowing, and the dust swirled about his feet. The road gleamed white and deserted before him. He swung along it, erect and British, caring nothing for dust or cold. From far away, in the direction of the jungle, there came the desolate cry of a jackal; but near at hand there was no sound but the rush of the wind past his ears and the swish of the dust along the way.

He came at length within sight of the dak-bungalow and saw beyond it the lights of the native city. Nick's bungalow, tucked away amongst its trees, was not visible.

"They're horribly near that treacherous hound," he murmured to himself, as he strode along. "I wonder if Nick realizes the risk. They might be murdered in their beds any night, and none of us down at the cantonments any the wiser. The Rajah and old Kobad Shikan would be horrified of course. It's so easy to be horrified—afterwards."

Unconsciously he quickened his steps. Somehow the danger had always seemed remote until that night. Had the day's adventure unsettled his nerves, or had he hitherto always underrated it? How ghastly it would be if—His thoughts broke off short. A figure had detached itself from the vagueness in front of him, and a whiff of rank tobacco smoke came suddenly to his nostrils.

Noel straightened himself and quickened his stride. He had the soldier's instinct for making the most of his height. The square, lounging figure that sauntered towards him looked almost short by comparison.

They met about fifty yards from the dak-bungalow. "Hullo!" said Max.

His tone was coolly fraternal, but his hand came out at the same time and Noel remembered the grip of it for some minutes after.

"What on earth have you come out here for?" he said.

Max smoked a pipe in one corner of his mouth and smiled with the other. "Like the girls," he said, "I've come out to get married."

"You're not going to marry Olga!" said Noel quickly and fiercely.

"That's just what I want to talk to you about," said Max. "Shall we walk?" He took his brother by the arm and led him forward. "I thought a talk in the open would be preferable. My hutch in this beastly little inn is not precisely inviting. I go to Nick's bungalow to-morrow."

"The devil you do!" said Noel.

The hand on his arm was not removed. It closed very slowly and surely. "Look here, old chap," Max said, "say what you like to me and welcome, if it does you any good. But there is no actual necessity for you to express your feelings. For I know what they are; and—I'm infernally sorry."

The words were quietly uttered, but they sent a shock of amazement through Noel. He stood still and stared. He had never heard anything of the kind from Max before.

Steadily Max drew him on. "When I wrote you that letter in the autumn, I meant you to do exactly what you have done. I didn't of course anticipate playing such a heathen trick on you as cutting you out. I regarded myself at that time as out of the running. Circumstances which there is no need to discuss had set dead against me, and I had reason to believe that she might need an able-bodied man's protection. Nick is all very well as a moral force, but physically he is a negligible quantity. I didn't fancy the idea of her coming out here with the chance of the aforementioned danger cropping up."

"What danger?" said Noel, abruptly.

Max hesitated a moment. "It's rather a long story. There was another fellow—a great hulking bounder. I was half afraid he might follow her out here and make himself objectionable. I thought you would probably get friendly with her, and she might turn to you for help if she needed it. You're the sort of chap a woman would turn to. And anyhow, I know you're sound fundamentally."

"Do you?" murmured Noel.

Max went on. "At that time I never thought of coming out here myself. It was Nick who first suggested it at a time when I believed my chances to be nil. And gradually the idea took hold of me. We had been almost engaged before. And though I didn't believe in my luck any longer, I thought I would have one last shot. Kersley backed me as usual. I am to go into partnership with him when I get back. He urged me to come, even said I owed it to her. I wasn't so sure of that myself, but events have proved him justified. I thought in any case I should only hurt myself and that wouldn't matter much. Afraid I behaved like a selfish ass. But I didn't know how far matters had gone, or even if they were likely to move at all. She isn't the sort of girl that attracts at first sight. It never occurred to me to be attracted till I found out how badly she disliked me. Then I used to bait her, and I liked her spirit. After that—" an odd, tender note had crept into his voice; he stopped abruptly.

Noel set his teeth and tramped along in dogged silence.

For a few seconds Max followed his example; then took up his discourse at the final point. "So I chanced a final throw and came out here; I thought at the worst she could only send me away again, and I should be no more badly off than I was before. Well, I got here, and the first thing. I heard was that Nick was giving a picnic at Khantali, and that there was a man-eater there. My informant was a native groom at the inn. He seemed to believe in the man-eater, and as I had equipped myself with a Winchester with the idea of solacing myself with big game when I had been given my conge, I armed myself and went to have a look for him. You know the rest. I must admit I was nearly as staggered as she was when I saw her come out of the temple. As soon as I had a moment for thought, it occurred to me that I should be probably one too many if I presented myself then. It was your chance, not mine; so I decided with your connivance to lie low. This evening I called to see the result. I fully expected to be told that you and she were engaged, and I went prepared to congratulate. But directly I saw her, I knew that it was otherwise. And I realized that my luck had turned."

"She accepted you?" Curt and straight came the words.

"She did." Calmly and deliberately Max made answer. "I had sent her a ring earlier in the day, which little attention, it seems, she had attributed to you."

"Yes; she tried to return it this morning." Noel spoke with his eyes fixed straight ahead.

"She is wearing it to-night," said Max.

Noel tramped on again in silence.

Suddenly he stopped, facing round upon his brother with a gesture that was openly passionate. "Damn it, Max! You're deuced cool, I must say! Aren't there girls enough in England without your posting out here to take the one I want? She's half in love with me already. I'd have won her over in another week—in less! Very likely to-morrow!"

Max stood still. They had nearly reached the gate that led into Nick's compound. The rustle of the cypresses in the night-wind came to them as they faced each other. Noel's hands were clenched, Max's well out of sight in the depths of his pockets.

He did not speak at once, but there was no hint of irresolution in his attitude.

"Yes," he said, after a moment. "You jolly nearly died for her, and if anyone has a right to her, you have. But, my dear chap, you can't get away from the fact that she was mine before you ever met her. I know that now. I didn't before to-night, though so far as I am concerned, she has been the only girl in the world for a very long time. Not knowing it, I'd have been quite ready—I'd be ready now—for you to have her; glad even. But knowing it—well, it rather alters the case, doesn't it? You see," his mouth twisted a little in the old cynical curve, "we can't hand her about and barter for her like a bale of goods. She's a woman; and—whether we like it or not—in these things the woman must have the casting vote."

"It's so beastly unfair!" Noel broke in hotly, boyishly. "Why the devil couldn't you stay away a little longer?"

"And suppose I had!" For the first time Max spoke sternly. "Suppose I had!" he repeated, with eyes that suddenly shot green in the starlight. "Suppose you had won her before I came—suppose you'd been engaged, and I had come along afterwards! What then?"

"You'd have been too late," said Noel, the dogged note in his voice.

"You wouldn't have set her free?" Max flung the question with brief contempt.

"No!" Noel flung back the answer fiercely.

"Not if you had known she cared for me first?" Max's voice was suddenly quiet and chill. It expressed a cold curiosity, no more.

Noel writhed before it. "Confound you, no!" he cried violently.

There fell a sudden deep silence. Max stood quite motionless during the passage of seconds, watching, waiting, while Noel stood before him, fiercely threatening.

Then, very abruptly, as if he had suddenly discovered that there was nothing to wait for, he turned on his heel.

"Good-night!" he said, and walked away.

He went with his customary, sauntering gait, but there was absolute decision in his movements. It was quite obvious that he had no intention of returning.

And Noel made no attempt to call him back. He stood with his black brows drawn, and dumbly watched him go.

At the end of thirty seconds, he wheeled slowly round, and turned his sullen face towards Nick's bungalow. As he did so, there was a slight movement near the gate as of someone stealthily retreating.

Instantly suspicion leaped, keen-edged with anxiety, into his brain. In a flash his former fears rushed back upon him. They were so horribly near the native city, so horribly undefended. He remembered the bomb on the parade-ground, and felt momentarily physically sick.

In another instant he was speeding to the open gate. He turned sharply in between the cypresses, and was met by a white-clad, cringing figure that bowed to the earth at his approach.

Noel stopped dead in sheer astonishment. So sudden had been the apparition that he scarcely restrained himself from running into it. Then, being in no pacific mood, his astonishment passed into a blaze of anger.

"What the devil are you sneaking about here for?" he demanded. "What are you doing?"

The muffled figure before him made another deep salaam. "Heaven-born, I am but a humble seller of moonstones. Will his gracious excellency be pleased to behold his servant's wares?"

It was ingratiatingly spoken—the soft answer that should have turned away wrath; but Noel's tolerance was a minus quantity that night. Moreover, he had had a severe fright, and his Irish blood was up.

"You may have moonstones," he said, "but you didn't come here to sell them. The city's full of you infernal budmashes. It's a pity you can't be exterminated like the vermin you are. Be off with you, and if I ever catch you skulking round here again, I'll give you a leathering that you'll never forget for the rest of your rascally life!"

The moonstone-seller bowed again profoundly. "Yet even a rat has its bite," he murmured in a deferential undertone into his beard.

He turned aside, still darkly muttering, and shuffled past Noel towards the road.

Noel swung round on his heel as he did so, and administered a flying kick by way of assisting his departure. Possibly it was somewhat more forcible than he intended; at least it was totally unexpected. The moonstone-seller stumbled forward with a grunt, barely saving himself from falling headlong.

A momentary compunction pricked Noel, for the man was obviously old, and, by the peculiar fashion in which he recovered his balance, he seemed to be crippled also. But the next moment he was laughing, though his mood was far from hilarious. For, with an agility as comical as it was surprising, the moonstone-seller gathered up his impeding garment and fled.

He was gone like a shadow; the garden lay deserted; Noel's bitterness of soul returned. He glanced towards the darkness of the cypresses where they had walked only that morning, and a great misery rose and engulfed his spirit. A second or two he stood hesitating, irresolute. Should he go in and see her? Vividly her pale face came before him, but glorified with a radiance that was not for him. No, he could not endure it. By to-morrow he would have schooled himself. To-morrow he would wish her joy. But to-night—to-night—he drained the cup of disappointment for the first time in his gay young life and found it bitter as gall.

With a fierce gesture he flung round and tramped away.



CHAPTER XI

THE FAITHFUL WOUND OF A FRIEND

All the social circle of Sharapura and most of the native population usually assembled on the polo-ground to witness the great annual match between the Rajah's team and the officers stationed at the cantonments. It was to be followed by a dance at the mess-house in the evening, to which all English residents far and near had been bidden, and which the Rajah himself and his chief Minister, Kobad Shikan, had promised to attend.

The day was a brilliant one, and Olga looked forward to its festivities with a light heart. The thought of Noel was the only bitter drop in her cup of happiness, but instinct told her that his wound would be but a superficial one. She was sorry on his behalf, but not overwhelmingly so. As Nick had wisely observed, it would be far more fitting for him to wait and marry Peggy Musgrave. They were eminently well suited to each other, and would be playfellows all their lives.

She expected Max to present himself in the course of the morning, and he did not disappoint her. He made his casual appearance soon after Nick had departed for the Palace, and found her in the garden. Not alone, however, for Daisy had arrived before him to see how Olga fared after the previous day's adventure.

Max, strolling out to them, was met by Olga in a glowing embarrassment which he was far from sharing, and introduced forthwith to Daisy as "Noel's brother."

Daisy, who had just been listening to a somewhat halting account of his unexpected arrival the day before, marked her very evident confusion and leaped to instant comprehension. So this was the cause of Noel's reticence! She shook hands with Max with a very decided sense of disappointment, resenting his intrusion on Noel's behalf, and with womanly criticism marvelling that this thick-set unromantic Englishman could ever have held the girl's fancy when Noel, the handsomest officer in the district, had been so obviously at her feet.

She heaved a little sigh for Noel even while she said, smiling, "I have just been hearing of your dramatic arrival yesterday, Dr. Wyndham. You could scarcely have chosen a more thrilling moment."

He smiled also, with slight cynicism. "Yes, there were plenty of thrills for all of us," he said. "Have you heard the latest?"

Daisy's eyes travelled from him to Olga, who stretched out her left hand, bearing Max's ring upon it, and said, very sweetly and impulsively: "Oh, Mrs. Musgrave, I was just going to tell you about it. Please don't think me deceitful! It—it—it only happened last night."

"My darling child!" Daisy said. She took the outstretched, trembling hand and folded it in a soft, warm clasp. Her eyes went back to Max, whose expression became more ironical than ever under her scrutiny. It was as if he observed and grimly ridiculed her jealousy on his brother's behalf. And Daisy's resentment turned to a decided sense of hostility. She discovered quite suddenly but also quite unmistakably that she was not going to like this young man.

She was sure the green eyes under their shaggy red brows saw and mocked her antipathy. There was even a touch of insolence about him as he said: "I'm afraid it's taken your breath away, but it is not such a sudden arrangement as it appears. Strange to say all women don't fall in love with me at first sight. Olga, for instance, did quite the reverse, didn't you, Olga?"

His eyes mocked Olga now openly and complacently. Daisy told herself indignantly that she had never in her life witnessed anything so disgustingly cold-blooded. He positively revolted her. She saw him as a husband, selfish, supercilious, accepting with condescension his young wife's eager devotion, and her congratulations died on her lips. For Daisy was a woman with whom a man's homage counted for much. She had been accustomed to it all her life and its absence was an offence unpardonable. And then suddenly Olga overcame her shyness, and boldly came to the rescue.

"Max, don't make Mrs. Musgrave think you a beast! It isn't fair to me. He isn't a bit like this really," she added to Daisy. "It's all affectation. Nick knows that."

Daisy laughed. The girlish speech helped her, if it did not remove her doubts.

She gave her free hand to Max, saying, "I suppose we are none of us ourselves to strangers, but, since you are engaged to Olga, I hope you will not place me in that category. You are very, very lucky to have won her, and I wish you both every happiness."

Max bowed, still with a hint of irony. "It's nice of you not to condole with Olga," he said. "I feel inclined to myself. Perhaps, if I am not wanted, I may be allowed to go and have a smoke on the verandah. I am expecting my traps to turn up directly," he added to Olga.

"Oh, we must come and see about them," she said. "The khit will show you your room. Max is going to put up with us now," she told Daisy, with a smile that pleaded with her friend to be lenient.

Daisy's hand still held hers. "That is nice, dear," she said. "I must be getting back to Peggy. Is your fiance coming to the regimental dance to-night?"

"Oh, Max,"—Olga's eyes shone upon him,—"you will, won't you? But of course you will. Noel will have settled that."

The corner of Max's mouth went down. "Noel is not in the habit of settling my affairs great or small," he observed. "If I go at all, it will be in the little god's train and under his auspices alone. But I warn you I'm not much of a dancer."

"What nonsense!" said Olga. "All doctors dance. It's part of their hospital training."

"Is it?" said Max. "Then my medical education is incomplete. My partners generally prefer to sit out after the first round."

"I shan't sit out with anyone," declared Olga. "It's such a waste of time. One can do that any day."

"So one can," said Max. "I hope you are not hurrying away on my account, Mrs. Musgrave. My business here is not urgent. It will very well wait."

He was evidently in an incurably cynical mood, and Olga gave him up in despair. She went with Daisy to the gate, and, with her arms round her neck, besought her, half-laughing, not to be misled by appearances.

"I was myself," she confessed. "I actually hated him once. But now—but now—"

"But now it's all right," smiled Daisy. "Run back to him, dear child! I should imagine he is the sort of young man who doesn't like to be kept waiting."

That was all the criticism she permitted herself, but Olga, returning slowly to Max on the verandah, was regretfully aware that the impression he had made upon this friend of hers was far from favourable.

"It isn't nice of you, Max," she began, as she reached him. "It really isn't nice of you."

But she got no further than that for the moment, for Max literally lifted her off her feet, holding her fast in his arms while he kissed the colour into her white face, finally lowering her into Nick's favourite hammock and dexterously settling her therein.

"You shouldn't!" she protested feebly. "You shouldn't! And indeed I'm not going to lie here."

"You are going to do as you are told, fair lady," he responded grimly. "What have you been lying awake half the night for?"

"I didn't," she began. "At least—" seeing his look of open incredulity—"it couldn't have been so long as that. And I—I had a lot of things to think about. No, Max, you're not to feel my pulse! Max, I won't have it!"

She pulled desperately, and freed herself. Max thrust his hands into his pockets, faintly smiling, and stood over her, contemplating her.

"Well, tell me all the things you had to think about!" he said.

She shook her head, flushed still and slightly distressed. "No, Max."

He stooped over her, searching her face. "Do you like being engaged, Olga?" he asked.

She sat up quickly and leaned against him, her hands clasped upon his arm.

"I'm happy enough to—to want to cry," she said, a slight catch in her voice.

He held her closely again, her head against his heart. "No, that's not the reason," he said softly into her ear. "Something is bothering you, isn't it?"

She swallowed once or twice and nodded. "I'm—foolish," she managed to utter after a moment.

"Never mind if you can't help it!" he said. "Tell me what it's about!"

But she was silent.

"Afraid I shan't understand?" he questioned.

Her hand nestled into his, but she kept her face down. "I wrote a long, long letter to Dad last night," she remarked irrelevantly, after a pause. "He—I'm afraid he'll be rather surprised."

"I wonder," said Max.

She glanced up for an instant. "Did he know you were coming out here to me?" she asked.

"He did." There was a queer note of dry exultation in Max's reply.

"Oh, Max!" Her head went back to its resting-place. "He thought I didn't like you, you know. What—what did he say?"

"He told me I was a fool," said Max.

Olga laughed. "Dear Dad! I suppose he thought you were wasting your time over a wild goose chase."

"Yes; he didn't anticipate my catching my wild goose, I admit. Kersley on the other hand was so confident that he practically hoofed me out of England. He wants a married partner, you know, so perhaps he was not altogether disinterested."

Again the complacent note sounded in Max's voice.

Olga's fingers closed tightly on his hand. "Is that why you are so anxious to get married?" she asked, in a muffled voice.

Max's fingers responded so swiftly and so mercilessly that she cried out with the pain. "Max! How brutal!"

"You deserved it," said Max without compunction.

"But I didn't! I only asked a simple question," she protested.

"No, you didn't; it was a compound one." He opened his hand and sternly regarded the crushed fingers. "If you develop claws, Olga," he said, "you must expect trouble."

She laughed again. "It isn't a question of developing: they're there—full-grown. Do you remember that day I stabbed you with my darning-needle?"

"I do," said Max. He turned his hand over and showed her a small white scar on the back. "I suppose you never realized that that was the beginning of everything?"

"It wasn't with me!" declared Olga. "I could have slain you that night!"

"Because I told you you ought to be whipped," said Max. "It was quite true, you know. Dr. Jim would have said the same. He would probably have done it too."

"I'm sure he wouldn't!" Olga lay back in the hammock with the scarred hand between her own. "Dad is very just. He would have realized that you were quite insufferable."

"That wouldn't have justified you, my child," maintained Max.

She snapped her fingers at him. "I'd do it again to-day if you were as horrid as you were then."

"Not you!" said Max.

She opened her eyes. "You think I wouldn't dare?"

He looked back at her with composure. "It is more a matter of caring than daring, my dear," he said. "Your heart wouldn't be in it. But you are afraid of me all the same."

She coloured and turned the subject. "When is Sir Kersley going to make you his partner?"

"Directly I return," said Max.

"And when will that be?"

He considered a moment. "I expect to reach England in a month from now."

"Max!" She sat up again quickly. "Oh, you're not going so soon!" she said.

He put his arm round her shoulders. "But you will be coming back yourself in April. Nick told me so."

"In April! But that's aeons away!" protested Olga.

His eyes looked down into hers, and the old gleam which once she had taken for mockery hovered there. Her own eyes flickered and sank before it. There was something quick and fiery in it that she could not meet.

"I'll take you back with me," he said, "if you will come."

She started a little. "Oh, no!" she said.

"Why 'Oh, no'?" he enquired.

She was silent for a moment, her face downcast. "I couldn't leave Nick—possibly—out here," she said then.

"Why not? Can't the little god take care of himself?"

"No. And I wouldn't let him if he could. I shouldn't feel easy about him. He—he—I feel as if he is trying to walk a tight rope every day."

"It's a sort of thing he ought to do very well, I should say," observed Max. "But what is he doing it for?"

She looked up. "He thinks he is getting on splendidly," she said. "He and the Rajah are such friends! But the Rajah isn't everybody, and I'm not sure even of him. Someone tried to blow up the fort with a bomb not so very long ago."

"Oh, that's the game, is it?" said Max. "You think a similar little joke might be played on Nick, and if so you want to be there to see."

She smiled faintly, in a sense relieved that he did not treat the matter too seriously. "It makes one a little nervous for him," she said, "though of course there may be no reason for it."

"I see," said Max. "It's just a nightmare, is it?"

He was watching her intently, and under his look her heart quickened a little.

"It may be all nonsense, yes," she admitted. "But in any case I won't leave Nick out here. He is in my special charge."

He laughed. "Well, there's no appealing against that. You will be home in April then. Will you marry me on Midsummer Day?"

Olga's eyelids flickered and fell. "I must think about it," she said.

He pinched her cheek. "Say Yes," he said.

She turned her face impulsively; her lips just touched his hand. "I wonder if I shall, Max," she said.

"Say Yes," he repeated, still softly but with insistence.

She leaned her head against him. "I'd like to say Yes," she said. "But somehow—somehow—I have a feeling that—that—"

"My dear," said Max very practically, "don't be silly!"

She turned and clung to him very tightly. "Max, I—I've got something—on my mind."

His arm, very steady and strong, grew close about her. "Tell me!" he said.

Haltingly she complied. "You will think me morbid. I can't help it. Max, all last night—all last night—I felt as if—as if a spirit were with me—calling—calling—calling, trying to make me understand something, trying to—to warn me—of some danger—I couldn't see."

She broke off in tears. It seemed impossible to put the thing into words. It was so intangible yet in her eyes so portentous. Max's hand was on her head, stilling her agitation. She wondered if he thought her very absurd, but he did not leave her long in doubt.

"There's nothing to cry about, my dear," he said. "Your nerves were a bit strung up after the tiger episode, that's all. They will quiet down in a day or two. All the same"—his hand pressed a little—"I'm glad you told me. A trouble shared is only half a trouble, is it? And I have a right to all your troubles now."

He took her handkerchief, and dried her eyes with the utmost kindness; then turned her face gently upwards.

"Is that quite all?" he asked.

She tried to smile, with quivering lips.

"Not quite?" he questioned. "Come, I may as well know, mayn't I?"

"I don't know that there is anything gained by telling you," she said. "You never liked talking about your cases to me."

He frowned a little. "My dear girl, what particular case is it you have on your mind?"

She hesitated. "You won't be vexed?"

"Vexed? No!" he said; but he continued to frown slightly notwithstanding.

"I hope you won't be," Olga said, "because I simply can't argue about it. Max, I sometimes think to myself that if—you hadn't known—and Violet hadn't come to know—about—about her mother—things might have been—very different."

"Meaning I should have fallen in love with her?" said Max.

She nodded. "It may be a breach of confidence, but—I think I'll tell you now. Max, she cared for you."

She spoke the words with an effort, her eyes turned from him. Perhaps she was afraid that she might encounter cynicism in the vigilant green eyes, and she could not have endured it at that moment.

But at least there was none in his voice when he said: "Yes, I know she did. That was what made her hate me so badly afterwards. I am very sorry, Olga; but, for your comfort let me tell you this. I should never—under any circumstances—have come to care for her. You won't like me for saying it, but she was never more to me than a very interesting case, and, apart from medical investigation, she would simply not have existed so far as I was concerned. She didn't appeal to me."

Olga winced a little. "Oh, Max, but she was so beautiful!" she urged wistfully.

He made a slight gesture of impatience. "I don't dispute it. But what of it? My brain is not the sort to be turned by beauty. There was too much of it for my taste. She was exotic. That type of beauty gives me indigestion."

Olga looked at him reproachfully. "You didn't like her, Max?"

"Not much," said Max.

She made a movement as if she would withdraw herself from him, but he quietly and very resolutely held her still. "Although you knew she cared for you!" she said.

"Yes, in spite of that;" said Max. "In fact, I felt a bit vexed with her for complicating matters in that fashion. Goodness knows I never gave her the smallest reason for it!"

Olga laughed faintly, with an unwonted touch of bitterness. "It's a pity women are such doting fools," she said.

He looked at her attentively. "Did you say that?" he asked.

She met his look, not without defiance. "Yes, and I meant it too. It's such a wicked waste. And I think—- I think—in her case it was something far worse. I believe it was that which in a very great measure helped to unhinge her mind."

"How could I help it?" demanded Max almost fierily. "I never wanted her to care."

"That was just the cruel part of it," said Olga. "It was just your utter indifference that broke her heart."

"Good heavens!" said Max.

He let her go very abruptly and leaned against one of the verandah posts as if he needed support.

Olga tilted herself over the side of the hammock and stood up. "You couldn't help not caring," she said. "But—you might have been a little kinder. You needn't have made her hate and fear you."

Max surveyed her grimly from under drawn brows. "My dear," he said, "you simply don't know what you are talking about."

That fired her. A quiver of passion went suddenly through her. She faced him as she had faced him in the old days with a courage that sustained itself.

"Indeed, I know!" she said. "Better than it is in your power to understand. Oh, I know now what made her—hate you so."

The last words came with a rush, almost under her breath; but they were fully audible to the man lounging before her.

He did not speak at once, and yet he did not give the impression of being at a loss. He continued to lounge while he contemplated her with eyes of steady inscrutability.

He spoke at length with extreme deliberation. "And so you want to take me to task for breaking her heart, do you?"

"She was my friend," said Olga quickly.

He stood up slowly. "And would you have liked it better if I had made love to her?"

She flinched as if that stung. "No—no! But you might have been kind—you might have been kind—since you knew she cared. If you hadn't made such a study of her, she would never have looked your way. That was the cruel part of it—the dreadful, cold-blooded part."

"What do you mean by kind?" said Max. "You don't seem to realize that the poor girl was mad. If I had been soft with her she would have been beyond my control at once."

"Oh, but she wasn't mad then," Olga's hands clasped each other tightly. "Max," she said, and there was no longer indignation in her voice—it held only pain, "I'm afraid you and I have a good deal to answer for."

"Perhaps," said Max. He was frowning still; but he did not appear angry. She did not wholly understand either his look or tone. "I suppose she thought I treated her badly," he said.

Olga nodded silently.

"She told you so?" His voice sounded stern; yet, still he did not seem to be angry.

"No, never." Almost involuntarily she answered him. "But she did say—once—that you cared only for your profession, that it was not in you to—to worship any woman."

"And you think that too?" he said.

His voice was softer now; it moved her subtly. She turned her face away from him and stifled a sob in her throat.

"No; but, Max—to build our life-happiness on—on the ruin of hers; that—that—is what troubles me."

"But my dear girl!" he said. He took her two hands clasped into his. "I can't reason with you, Olga," he said. "You are quite unreasonable, and you know it. If you were any other woman, I should say that you felt in the mood for a good cry and so were raking up any old grievance for a pretext. As you are you, I won't say that. But I absolutely prohibit crying in my presence. If you want to indulge in tears, you must wait till I am out of the way."

She smiled at him faintly. "Max, I—I loved her-so; and I wasn't even with her—when she died."

Max was silent, suddenly and conspicuously silent, so that she knew on the instant that he had no sympathy to bestow on this point.

Yet an inner longing that was passionate urged her to brave his silence. Pleadingly she raised her face to his.

"Max, you were there, I know. Tell me—tell me about it!"

But he looked straight back at her with eyes that told her nothing, and she saw that his face was hard. For a little she tried to withstand him, mutely beseeching him; but at length her eyes fell before his.

And then Max spoke, briefly yet not unkindly. "My dear Olga, believe me, in nine cases out of ten it is better to forget those things that are behind; and this is one of the nine. I can't tell you anything on that subject, so we had better regard it as closed."

It was a bitter disappointment to her; but she saw that there was no appealing against his decision. She made as though she would turn away.

But he stopped her with quiet mastery. "No, I won't have that," he said. "I am not so cold-blooded as you think. I haven't hurt you—really, Olga!"

A note of tenderness sounded in his voice. She yielded to him, albeit under protest.

"But you have!" she said.

He held her in his arms again. He kissed her drooping lips. "Well, if I have," he said, "it's the faithful wound of a friend. Can't you forgive it?"

That Max should ever ask forgiveness was amazing. Her bitterness went out like the flare of a match. She laid her head against his neck.

"Max—dear, I didn't mean to be horrid!"

"You couldn't be if you tried," he said.

She clung faster to him. "How can you say so? I've hardly ever been anything else to you."

"When are you going to reform?" said Max, with his lips against her forehead.

"Now," said Olga into his neck.

"Really?" Max's voice came down to her very softly. "Then—won't you say Yes to the Midsummer Day project?"

She was silent for a little, as if considering the matter or summoning her resolution. Then with sudden impulse she lifted her face fully to his.

"Yes, Max," she said.



CHAPTER XII

A LETTER FROM AN OLD ACQUAINTANCE

It was universally acknowledged that the Rajah's Prime Minister, Kobad Shikan, was the most magnificent figure on the polo-ground that afternoon. The splendour of his attire was almost dazzling. He literally glittered with jewels. And his snow-white beard added very greatly to the general brilliance of his appearance. It was not his custom to attend social gatherings at all. Unlike the Rajah, he was by no means British in his tastes; and he never wore European costume. At the same time no one had ever detected any anti-British sentiments in him. He walked with such extreme wariness that no one actually knew what his sentiments were.

Why he had decided to grace the occasion with his presence was a matter for conjecture. Owing possibly to his habitual reticence, he was no favourite with the English portion of the community. Daisy Musgrave had nicknamed him Bluebeard long since, and Peggy firmly believed that somewhere in the depths of the Rajah's Palace this old man kept his chamber of horrors.

"What on earth has he come for, Nick?" murmured Olga, as they found places in the pavilion.

Nick laughed, a baffling laugh. "I asked him to come," he said.

"You, Nick! Why?"

He frowned at her. "Don't ask questions, little girl! Ah, that's a fine pony down there! Ye gods! What wouldn't I give to have another fling at the game!"

"Oh, but you never must!" said Olga quickly. "I couldn't bear you to take that risk indeed."

"You'd like to wrap me up in cotton-wool and seal me in a safe," laughed Nick.

"No; but, Nick, you are so reckless," she said, with loving eyes upon him. "It would be madness, wouldn't it, Max?"

Max's shrewd look rested for a moment on his host. "Little gods sometimes accomplish what mere mortals would never dream of attempting," he said. "How soon do you expect to be Viceroy, Nick?"

"Oh, not for a year or two," said Nick. "I haven't talked it over with my wife yet. There's no knowing. She may object. Wives are sometimes hard to please, you know." He flung a humorous glance at Max, and turned to leave them. "You will excuse me, I am sure, with the utmost pleasure. I am going to play spelicans with Kobad Shikan."

He was gone, and Olga turned to Max, smiling somewhat uneasily. "I wish he wouldn't," she said.

"What? Play spelicans? I should think he might prove as great an adept at that as walking the tight rope," said Max. "Ah, here comes your friend Mrs. Musgrave! She went home and told her husband this morning that I was the most objectionable young man she had ever met."

Olga's eyes widened with indignation. "Max, I'm sure she didn't, and if she did it was entirely your own fault. I believe you wanted her to think so."

"Some people have an antipathy to red hair," observed Max. "You had yourself at one time, I believe. Hullo! Is that our gallant Noel in polo-kit? What a magnificent spectacle!"

It was Noel following Daisy, whose rickshaw he had just spied, and bearing the proud Peggy on his shoulder.

He came straight to Olga, smiling with supreme ease, lowered Peggy from her perch, and dropped into the vacant seat beside her. Daisy passed on with a smile to join the Bradlaws. Peggy remained, glued to her hero's side.

"I say," said Noel, "I hope you haven't been thinking me beastly rude, Olga. I've been wishing you happiness with all my heart all the morning, but I simply couldn't get round to tell you so."

It was charmingly spoken. Her hand lay in his while he said it. He did not seem to observe his brother on her other side. But Peggy observed him and clung to Noel's shoulder with wide, fascinated eyes fixed upon the stranger.

"Noel," cut in the high, baby voice, "isn't that an ugly man? Who's that ugly man, Noel?"

Noel squeezed Olga's hand and set it free to lift the small questioner to his knee.

"That handsome gentleman, Peggy, is my brother, and he is going to marry this pretty lady—whom you know. Any more questions?"

Peggy stared at Olga very seriously. "Do you want to marry him, Miss Ratcliffe?" she asked.

"Of course she does," said Max. "Everyone wants to marry me. It's a sort of disease that spreads like the plague."

Peggy's eyes returned to him and fixed him with grave attention.

"I don't want to marry you," she announced with absolute decision.

"You'd rather have the plague, eh?" suggested Noel.

"No," said Peggy, and turned to him with her sweet, adoring smile. "But I'm goin' to marry you; aren't I, Noel?"

"Hear, hear!" said Noel with enthusiasm.

"Highly suitable," said Max.

"I hope you will both be very happy," said Olga, with a touch of earnestness that she emphasized with a secret pressure of Noel's arm.

"We shall be as happy as the day is long," said Noel, smiling straight into her eyes. "Now, little sweetheart," turning to Peggy, "I must be off. We've got some tough work in front of us."

"I hope you'll win," said Olga.

He stood up, looking very straight and handsome. His dark eyes, laughing downwards, seemed to challenge her to detect any shadow of disappointment in them.

"Win! Why, of course we shall. We're going to lick Akbar & Co. into the middle of next week—for the honour of the Regiment and Badgers."

He cast an impudent glance over his shoulder towards his commanding officer, with whom, however, he was a supreme favourite; smiled again at Olga while wholly over-looking Max, then swung around on his heel and departed.

Peggy stood for a moment watching him go, then with sudden resolution put aside the arm Olga had passed around her and ran after him.

"Highly suitable," Max said again.

Olga turned to him. "That's what Nick says. But it's such a long while for him to wait, poor boy."

"That wouldn't hurt him," said Max. "Do him all the good in the world, in fact. He's too much of a spoilt darling at present."

"Oh, Max, how can you say so? He is so splendid."

Max's mouth curved downwards. He said nothing.

"Max!" Olga's voice was anxious; it held a hint of pleading also, "you haven't—quarrelled, have you?"

Max turned deliberately and looked at her. "I never quarrel," he said.

"But you don't seem to be on very good terms," she said.

"The boy is such a puppy," Max said.

"Oh, he isn't!" she protested, flushing swiftly and very hotly. "He—he is the very nicest boy I know."

He laughed a little. "I believe you would have married him if I hadn't come along just in time."

Olga turned her burning face to the field. She was silent for a space, studying the mixed crowd assembled there, till, feeling his eyes persistently upon her, she was at length impelled to speak.

"It is quite possible," she said in a low voice.

"Really? You like him well enough for that?" Max's voice was quite calm, even impersonal. He spoke as one seeking information on a point that concerned him not at all.

Again for a time Olga was silent while the deep flush slowly died out of her face. At last with a little gesture of confidence only observable by him, she slipped her hand under his arm. "I wasn't in love with him, Max," she whispered. "But—I think—perhaps I could have been."

He pressed her hand to him with no visible movement. "And now?" he said.

"Ah, no, not now," she murmured, half-laughing. "You have quite put an end to that."

They were interrupted. Colonel Bradlaw had just heard of their engagement from Daisy, and came up to make Max's acquaintance and to offer his pompous felicitations.

Before these were over the game began, greatly to Olga's relief. She took a keen interest in it, and marked the adroit celerity with which the Rajah's team took the field with anxiety. The Rajah himself was an excellent player, and he was obviously on his mettle. Moreover, his ponies were superior to those of the British team; and the odds were plainly in his favour.

"Oh, he mustn't win; he mustn't!" said Olga feverishly.

"Don't get excited!" Max advised. "Follow the example of Nick's Oriental friend in front of us. He doesn't look as if red-hot pincers would make him lose his dignity."

"Horrid old man!" breathed Olga.

And yet Kobad Shikan was conversing with Nick with exemplary courtesy, giving no adequate occasion for such criticism.

"Is he another bete-noir of yours then?" asked Max.

She laughed a little. "Yes, I think he is detestable, and I believe he hates us all."

"Poor old man!" said Max.

All through that afternoon of splendid Indian winter, they watched the polo, talking, laughing, or intimately silent. All through the afternoon Nick remained with Kobad Shikan, airily marking time. And all through the afternoon Noel distinguished himself, whirling hither and thither, hotly, keenly, untiringly pressing for the victory. If the Rajah were on his mettle, so undoubtedly was he. He had never played so brilliantly before, and the wild applause he gained for himself should have been nectar to his soul. Yet to many it almost seemed that he did not hear it. He laughed throughout the game, but it was with set teeth, and once in a close encounter with the Rajah his eyes flamed open fury into the face of the Oriental as the latter swept the ball out of his reach.

It was a splendid fight, but the British team were outmatched. In the end, after a fierce struggle, they were beaten by a single goal.

Victors and vanquished came to the pavilion later and had tea with their supporters. But Noel did not return to Olga's side. He kept at a distance, surrounded by an enthusiastic group of fellow-subalterns.

Peggy, restrained by her mother from joining him, watched him with longing eyes; but she watched in vain. Noel did not so much as glance in their direction, and very soon he departed altogether with a brother-officer.

"Wyndham seems down on his luck," observed Major Forsyth, Noel's Major, to Daisy, to whom he had just brought tea. "He's no need to be. He played like a dozen devils."

She smiled with that touch of tenderness that all women had for Noel. "I expect he doesn't like being beaten, poor boy."

"He hasn't learned the art of taking it gracefully," said the Major. "But he shouldn't show temper. It's a sign of coltishness that I don't care for."

"Ah, well, he's young," said Daisy, with a sigh. "He'll get over that."

Her thoughts dwelt regretfully upon the young officer as she returned with Peggy. She believed that she understood Noel better than anyone else did just then.

Peggy did not understand him at all, and was deeply hurt by her cavalier's defection. She did think he might have said good-bye to her before he went.

Will, meeting them at the gate of their own compound, laughed down his small daughter's grievance. "Do you really suppose he could remember a midget like you?" he asked, as he tossed her on to his shoulder. "You expect too much of us, my baby."

"You wouldn't have goed away like that, Daddy," she protested, locking her small fingers lovingly under his chin.

"Ah, well, I'm old, you see," said Will. "I've learned how to please—or should I say how not to displease?—you sensitive ladies."

"Did Mummy teach you?" asked Peggy with interest.

Will laughed with his eyes on his wife's face. "On that subject," he said, "she taught me absolutely all I know."

Daisy smiled in return. "I set you some hard lessons, didn't I, Will?" she said. "Why, how late we are! I had no idea the evening mail was in. Peggy, run to ayah, darling! Only one letter for me! Who on earth is it from?"

She took it up and inspected the handwriting on the envelope.

"It's a bold enough scrawl," said Will. "Some male acquaintance apparently."

"No one interesting, I am sure," said Daisy.

She opened the envelope as she stood, withdrew the letter, and glanced at the signature.

The next instant she flushed suddenly and hotly. "That man!" she ejaculated.

"What man?" said Will.

She turned to the beginning of the letter. "Oh, it's no one you know, dear. A man I met long ago at Mahalaleshwar—that time you were at Bombay, soon after we married. He was a shocking flirt. So was I—in those days. But he got too serious at last, and I had to cut and run. I daresay there wasn't any real harm in him. It was probably all my own fault. It always is the woman's fault, isn't it?"

She twined her arm in his, looking up into his face with a little smile, half-mocking, half-wistful.

He stooped to kiss her. "Well, what does the bounder want?"

"Oh, nothing much," she said. "Simply, he finds himself in this direction after big game, and, having heard of our being here, he wants to know if we will put him up for a night or two—for the sake of old times, he has the effrontery to add."

"Do you want him?" asked Will, the echo of a fighting note in his voice.

She smiled again as she heard it. "No, not particularly. I am really indifferent. But I think it would look rather silly to refuse, don't you? Besides, it would be good for him to see how old and staid I have become."

Will looked slightly grim. Nevertheless, he did not argue the point. "All right, Daisy. Do as you think best!" he said.

She returned to her letter, still holding his arm. "That's very wise of you, Will," she said softly. "Then I suppose I shall write and tell him to come."

"What's the fellow's name?" asked Will.

Daisy turned again to the signature. "Merton Hunt-Goring. He was a major in the Sappers, but he has retired now, he says. He can't be very young. He was no chicken in those days. I didn't really like him, you know; but he amused me."