Captain Desmond, V.C.. Diver Maud

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СКАЧАТЬ at the path's end a tall figure stood awaiting her; and before Parbutti and the orderly had collected her belongings, she was in John Meredith's arms.

      The remarkable likeness between the two was very apparent as they stood together thus; though the man's face was marred by ill-health, and by the distressing prominence of his eye-bones and strongly-marked jaw. He led her into the dining-room with more of lover-like than brother-like tenderness; for despite his forty years no woman had yet dethroned this beautiful sister of his from the foremost place in his heart.

      He set her down at the breakfast-table, himself poured out her tea, and dismissed the kitmutgar as soon as might be, Honor watching him the while with troubled solicitude in her eyes.

      "It's crushing, John!" she said at length. "And you do look horribly ill."

      "Well, my dear girl, is it likely I'd desert the regiment, and forfeit a year of your good company unless devils within were pretty imperative?"

      She smiled and shook her head.

      "But you ought to have told us about it sooner, … me, at any rate. When did you know the decision of the Board?"

      "Yesterday. Desmond was with me at the time. I didn't write before that about things being uncertain, for fear the good old man should take fright and whisk you off home. And I thought that even if I couldn't square the Board, you'd find waiting out here for me the lesser evil."

      "Very much the lesser evil. What a barbarian people at home would think me if they knew it! And you must go, … when?"

      "In four or five days; as soon as my leave is sanctioned."

      "And, naturally, I stay here with you till then."

      "Well, … partially. But when your heavy luggage came yesterday, it seemed simpler to send it straight to the Desmonds, and that you should settle in and sleep over there. We're all sitting in one another's pockets here, and you and I can be together all day, never fear. Will that arrangement suit your Royal Highness?"

      "My Royal Highness is as wax in your hands," she answered, with a swift softening of face and voice. "I won't start being autocratic till I get you back again. Only – sit down at once, please. You don't look fit to stand."

      He obeyed with unconcealed willingness, at the same time handing her a note.

      "It is from Mrs Desmond. She is expecting you over there this afternoon."

      Honor looked mutinous.

      "But I want to stay with you. I shall see plenty of Evelyn later."

      "Still, I think we must spare her an hour to-day. The little woman's keen to see you, and I'd like Desmond to feel that we appreciate his prompt kindness. He'll be down at the Lines all the afternoon. It's our day for tent-pegging. You might ride down with Mrs Desmond, and bring me news of what my men are doing. I'm mad at not being able to be there myself."

      She deserted her breakfast, and knelt down beside him.

      "Dear man! Of course I'll go and find out all about it from Captain Desmond. I needn't stay long to do that."

      "No. You can say you want to get back to me. Desmond will understand."

      "He's rather a fine fellow, isn't he?"

      "One of the best I know. The last man who ought to be hampered by a woman."

      "I might take that as a dismissal! How about yourself!"

      "Ah, that's quite another matter." And he laid a hand upon the soft abundance of her hair. "Mine is only a two years' contract. And, in any case, I would never allow myself to be handicapped by a woman – not even by you. But I don't feel so certain about Desmond."

      "Poor little Evelyn! Do you mean, … is there any question of her really hampering him, … seriously?"

      Meredith hesitated. A half-smile hovered in his tired eyes.

      "As I'm strongly against the whole affair, and have hardly forgiven him yet for marrying at all, it is fairer for me to say nothing about her one way or the other. You must judge for yourself."

      CHAPTER II.

      I WANT TO BE FIRST

      "A breath of light, a pulse of tender fire,

      Too dear for doubt, too driftless for desire."

– Swinburne.

      Sixteen months earlier, Evelyn Dacre – having come out to India with a party of tourist friends – had chanced to spend Christmas week at Lahore: a week which brings half the Punjab together for purposes of festivity and sport. Here, by some mysterious process, which no science will ever be able to fathom or explain, she had cast an instantaneous and unaccountable spell over a man of rare singleness of purpose, whose heart was set to court action, danger, hardship in every conceivable form: a man for whom a girl-wife fresh out from "Home" seemed as hazardous an investment as could well be imagined.

      But with all his fine qualities of head and heart, Theo Desmond was little given to cool deliberation in the critical moments of life. This chance-met girl, fragile as a flower and delicately tinted as a piece of porcelain, full of enthusiasm for her new surroundings and of a delight half shy, half spontaneous in the companionship of a man so unlike the blasé, self-centred youths of her limited experience, had, for the time being, swept him off his feet. And men are apt to do unaccountable things during those hot-headed moments when the feet are actually off the ground.

      A moonlight picnic; an hour of isolated wandering in a garden of tombs; the witchery of the moment; the word too much; the glance that lingered to a look; – and the irrevocable was upon them. Desmond had returned to the Frontier, to a circle of silently amazed brother officers; and in less than three months from their time of meeting the two had become man and wife.

      Honor, having been away in England at the time, had had but a second-hand hearing of the whole affair; and for all the keenness of her present disappointment, a natural spark of interest was aroused in her at the prospect of spending a year with this unequally yoked husband and wife.

      She found her friend awaiting her in the verandah: a mere slip of womanhood, in a grey habit.

      "Oh, there you are at last, Honor!" she cried eagerly. "It's grand to see you again! I'm dreadfully sorry about Major Meredith – I am, truly. But it's just lovely getting you on a long visit like this. Come in and have tea before we start."

      And taking possession of the girl with both hands, she led her into the house, talking ceaselessly as she went.

      "It's really very charming of you two to be so pleased to have me," Honor said quietly, as she settled herself, nothing loth, in the spaciousness of Captain Desmond's favourite chair. Then, because her head still hummed with the clatter of travel, she fell silent; following with her eyes the movements of this graceful girl-wife, whose engaging air of frankness and simplicity was discounted, at times, by an odd lack of both dimly shadowed in the blue-green eyes.

      Evelyn Desmond's eyes were, not without reason, her dearest bit of vanity. The tint of the clear iris suggested sea shallows on a day of light cloud – more green than blue; yet with just enough of the sky's own colour to lend the charm of a constant variability, that harmonised admirably with her iridescent changes of mood.

      Honor Meredith, who understood her curious mingling of charm and unsatisfactoriness better than any one else СКАЧАТЬ