Page:Littell's Living Age - Volume 128.djvu/94

84 home, if not quite the shabby cottage of my subaltern days. But she, too, has since then known discomfort and simple ways of life, and whatever place she lives in will be sufficiently adorned. Surely it must be a good omen which takes me there again! Plenty of time had the young man to build his castles in the air, searching over and over again in her letters for something substantial on which to erect a foundation for his hopes. At times it seemed as if her letters breathed a tenderness which, as if she was won already, at any rate invited him to declare his passion; and then, again, reading them under the influence of the reaction which would follow any excess of hopefulness, he thought he could detect only a spirit of resignation and sorrowful clinging to the memory of the past, which would render his tale of love an insult. These letters were of old date, for during the late campaign he had received no news from her. The regiment had, however, been wandering amid wild parts, difficult to communicate with; mails had been lost, and Olivia's letters might have miscarried — her notions about Indian geography and the movements of the different armies he knew to be somewhat vague, while he, for his part, had been too constantly on the move to write often; but now that they were marching along the main line of road, he would surely receive some news. Thus he thought and hoped, as the regiment slowly covered the long track, marching by night, and getting through the stifling day in their tents as best they could, for the heat seemed much harder to bear now that the excitement of active service was ended, and each camping-ground looking the exact counterpart of the last — a brown, barren, burnt-up plain.

Now and then they would come to a European station, where the officers of the famous regiment were sure of a hospitable reception from the residents, and would pass the day in the comparative coolness of a house, setting out again at midnight on the dusty road.

It was at one of these stations that Yorke heard for the first time of the death of Mr. Cunningham in England, which it appeared had been known in India for some weeks. This accounts for her silence, thought he; no wonder she had not spirits to write when bowed down with this fresh calamity. And how heartless my last letter to her must have seemed, for she could not have supposed that I was ignorant of what everybody in India seemed to know! And being full of the news, he naturally spoke to Kirke about it the first time they met. They were spending the day as guests at different houses, but were to dine together at a regimental mess, and he met his commandant when riding into the mess-garden at dusk. They had never once referred to Olivia in conversation since the first day after Kirke's return from the hills in the previous autumn. Yorke was not sure if the other had guessed the state of his own feelings, but Kirke was a man who was wont to speak somewhat contemptuously of women in general, and had often expressed the opinion that soldiers were spoilt by marriage; and Yorke thought he would not look favourably on the idea of having a married second in command, still less one married to his cousin. Indeed Yorke fancied he could detect a tone of pique in Kirke's manner when congratulating him on the high regard entertained for him by Olivia, which induced him to abstain from talking about her, still more from any expression of wonder at not getting letters from her; and a reserve of this sort once set up became every day more difficult to break through. Now, however, Yorke made the attempt.

"Have you heard the news, colonel?" he said, as the two met at the garden entrance, and rode slowly up the drive together to the mess-house. "Have you heard the news of poor Cunningham's death?"

"Oh yes, of course," replied Kirke; "I heard of that some weeks ago: I thought everybody knew it. A case of liver, I believe; he was very bad, as it turned out, when he went home."

"I only heard of it this afternoon. This will alter Mrs. Falkland's plans, I suppose, and even delay her journey home? I have understood that she has no near relations to whom she could go. It is a sad situation for her; I have been able to think of nothing else all day." When he said this, the young fellow felt himself like a selfish hypocrite, being sensible in reality of a sensation of rapture, as if the loss of her father brought her one step nearer to himself.

"Very good of you. I am sure," replied Kirke, drily, and speaking slightly through his nose, as was his manner when intending to be sarcastic. "Yes, indeed, it is difficult to say what she is to do under the circumstances, isn't it? A handsome young woman like her wants a protector of some sort, doesn't she?"

Here they had arrived at the mess-