Page:Littell's Living Age - Volume 126.djvu/159

Rh and Falkland and I were stationed there with our regiments, ensigns both of us. Mackenzie Maxwell was there too; he had just joined the —th on first coming out, as assistant surgeon. Falkland and Cunningham were great friends even then; and when Mrs. Cunningham died — she was a famous beauty, poor thing, and died in the first year after her marriage — Falkland used to spend the best part of his time at Cunningham's house, looking after the baby, while its father was at cutchery: hundreds and hundreds of times I suppose he has dandled her on his knee. Then my regiment moved to Dinapore, and he got appointed to the staff in Afghanistan — his first piece of luck that was, for a lot of the fellows in his regiment were killed; and Cunningham sent the child home in charge of Mrs. Spangle, the collector's wife at Benares: Spangle was a very crack collector, and would have risen very high in the service if he hadn't died of liver. And now we are all met again after nearly twenty years, all except Spangle; I knew Falkland would not be long in coming over to see his god-daughter after she arrived. There he is, a brevet-colonel of three years' standing, and me still a captain, although nine and a half months senior to him in the service. See what it is to have luck. I don't grudge Falkland his brevets, you know; he has deserved them if ever a man did: but if our regiment had gone to Cabul, and his had gone down to Dinapore, things might have been very different."

As Yorke looked at Falkland's spare figure and erect carriage, and then at Captain Buxey's portly frame almost filling up the buggy, as he sat with pursed-up lips, small round eyes, and splay feet encased in easy shoes, he could not help thinking that perchance something of the differences in their careers might be due to the individual as well as to luck; but his sense of politeness restrained him from saying so.

Then came the hussar-ball. The invitations, of course, included one for Major Dumble and officers of the 76th N. I., and Yorke could not resist the temptation to take the advantage of it, although it was almost the first time since the regiment had been stationed at Mustaphabad that he had presented himself at an entertainment of the kind; for he fancied that the hussars and people generally were disposed to look down on the native infantry. The ball was one of exceptional brilliancy; for, besides that sundry travellers who were passing through the place had stopped to partake of the festivities, it happened that the camp of an exalted official was pitched there at the time, and the great person honoured the occasion by his presence, accompanied by a brilliant staff. Yorke, though impatient to be there, came late, and the room was quite full when he arrived. In truth, a brilliant spectacle — nearly forty ladies, and perhaps a hundred and fifty gentlemen, almost all officers in uniform; so large an assembly had never before been witnessed in Mustaphabad. But for our subaltern there was only one lady in the room, sitting, as he entered, on an ottoman at the far end. A dance was in progress, in which all the younger men who could get partners were engaged, and only two cavaliers were in immediate attendance on Miss Cunningham, — Captain Buxey on one side, whose stout figure, cased in a tight coatee, appeared in conspicuous profile as he stooped to talk to the lady; Colonel Tartar on the other. Yorke envied the paymaster his ease and self-possession, although, to be sure, he was old enough to be her father; but they were as nothing to the coolness of Colonel Tartar, who was lolling on the couch, resting on his left elbow, and nursing a leg with his right hand, so that Miss Cunningham had to turn half round and look quite down to speak to him. "Confound his impudence!" thought Yorke; "it is all very well to give himself airs with ordinary ladies, but has the man no sense of propriety to behave like this before such a goddess even in his own ball-room?"

Presently the colonel got up and walked away in a careless manner, and in a sudden fit of boldness Yorke approached the vacant spot.

Miss Cunningham gave him a gracious bow of recognition.

Yorke asked if he might venture to hope for the honour of dancing with her.

"I am really very sorry," she said, with a winning smile, "but I am afraid I am engaged for everything." She spoke as if she really were sorry for his disappointment, and held out her card for him to look at. "Again how different from most of our young ladies!" he thought. "Miss Peart, now, would have given a flippant toss to her silly little head, and laughed as if it were great fun to be able to refuse an invitation, and snub a fellow." Then he said aloud, looking at the card, "There are no names down