Sir John Armitage found Milnehill an exceedingly agreeable habitation.
He fell into the routine of the Colonel's habits as a man long
accustomed to a life and duties similar to those of his host only could
have done. Day by day he recovered of his querulousness and invalidism.
He even forgot the dreaded heir who had driven him from his new
inheritance, and began to be able to speak on ordinary subjects without
much allusion to the dreadful subject of marriage, and his own
perplexities in respect to it. Then Sir John, when once delivered from
himself, was a little of a humorist, and enjoyed the peculiarities of
the society in which he found himself. Numberless old Indian officers,
members of the Civil service, families who, without being of that
origin, had two or three sons in our oriental empire, and people more or
less connected with India, were to be found in the neighbourhood.
Indeed, with the mixture of a clergyman or two, a resident landed
proprietor, linked to the community by means of a son in the B.N.I., or
a daughter married in Calcutta, and one or two stray lawyers from
Edinburgh--this formed the whole of Colonel Sutherland's society, and no
small part of the general society of the neighbourhood.
These excellent people, to the greater part of whom the world consisted
of India and Edinburgh, whose associations were all connected either
with the kindly and limited circle of home, or with the _bizarre_ and
extraordinary life of the East, and to whom the rest of the world came
in by the way, a sort of unconsidered blank of distance between the two
points of interest, were as original and agreeable a community as one
could wish to meet with; experienced, for years of travel, of
intercourse with primitive people, and of universal command and
authority, had given a certain decision and authority to their
judgment; yet so singularly simple in respect to this European world and
its centres of civilisation, and so innocent of all public sentiment
other than the dominant Anglo-Saxon instinct of sway and rule over an
inferior race, that their views on general subjects had a freshness and
novelty which, if sometimes a little amusing, was always racy and
original. Knowing very little, except in words, of the races who contest
with us the supremacy of the modern world; of those powers so equally
balanced whose slightest move on either side sets all the kingdoms of
Christendom astir, and threatens contests bigger and more ominous than
any conquering campaign of the East; this community was good-humouredly
contemptuous of the incomprehensible ignorance of those dwellers at home
who knew no difference between Tamul and Hindostani, who innocently
imagined that a man at Agra, being in the same country with his brother
at Madras, might have a chance of meeting with him some day, or who
could not be made to comprehend the difference between a Dhobi and a
man of high caste. These strange ignorances they laughed at among
themselves with a pleasant feeling of superiority, and contested Indian
appointments and the new regulations of the Company with far greater
interest than the state of Europe could excite them into. One and
another had charge of a little troop of children, "sent home" for their
education. Somebody was always returning, somebody always "going out."
There was great talk, especially among the ladies, of outfits and their
comparative cheapness, and of the respective advantages and
disadvantages in travelling overland or by the Cape. Sir John, who was
Indian enough to find himself much at home in this society, was at the
same time man of the world enough to be amused by its characteristics.
He found it more entertaining to listen to a lady's troubles in a
journey to the hills, to the adventures of the dàkh, or the misbehaviour
of the Syces, than he had found it in recent days to bewail the
afflictions of a continental tour, the impositions of the inns, and the
failure of the cooks. Palanquins and howdahs were unquestionably more
picturesque than travelling carriages and _vetturini_, and the Dakh
Bungalow ten times more original than the _Hôtel d'Angleterre_ or the
_Römische Kaiser_. Sir John, for the moment, found himself so famously
entertained, that he showed no inclination whatever to abridge his stay
at Milnehill.
He liked his host, he liked the society, he liked the quarters; the
dinners were good, the curry superlative, the house extremely cosy. Then
the freedom of the bachelor life, free from any disagreeable claim of
duties, suited the baronet exactly. His room was exactly the size he
preferred, his fire always burned cheerfully, the Colonel left him to
himself with perfect good breeding and discreet kindness, forcing his
inclinations in nothing. General Mulligatawny, whose "policy" touched
one side of the humble enclosure of Milnehill, had two unmarried ladies
at present resident in his house, in whom the baronet felt a certain
interest, both bound for India, and consequently not to be seen or
treated with after a certain date, which greatly increased their
attractions. One of them, the General's grand-daughter, a pretty girl of
eighteen, to whom Sir John seriously, but secretly, inclined, and who,
he rather more than suspected, was pretty certain to laugh in his face
at any avowal of his incipient sentiment; the other, a handsome woman of
thirty, youngest of all the said General's dozen children, "going out"
to keep house for a brother, who had already got through two wives, and
preferred a little interregnum before looking for another. This latter
lady, Sir John felt with a little terror, was what people call
"extremely suitable," and the very person for him. Consequently, he
conceived a great dread of her, mingled with a little anxiety to look
well in her presence. With these attractions to the neighbourhood, is it
wonderful that Sir John showed little inclination to leave Milnehill?
The week passed, and another week followed it. There was still no news
from Roger Musgrave, and the Colonel grew at once impatient and anxious.
These feelings, struggling with his punctilious and old-fashioned
hospitality, made him exceedingly uncomfortable. He could no longer
enjoy the presence of his guest, while at the same time it was against
all his traditions of friendliness to suggest anything to him which
should shorten his stay, or make him feel himself unwelcome. The
Colonel, to whom all the varied sentiments of life had come in their due
season, could not see the baronet's perplexities and pre-occupations in
presence of womankind without secret amusement and wonder; and Sir
John's regards, divided between Miss Mulligatawny and her niece,
surprised his host into occasional accesses of private laughter; but
this by no means sufficed to divert the Colonel, as it diverted his
visitor, from the important object which had originally brought him
here. Colonel Sutherland never entered his cosy dining-room in the
morning without the dread of finding a letter from Roger, telling of
some step which was irrevocable, and carried him quite out of their
reach. He went to rest with that thought in the evening, and took it up
on waking the next day: he began to be quite restless and full of
discomfort; he even meditated setting out by himself to London to find
the young man: he wrote to various old friends in town, begging them to
make inquiries. Then he repeated to himself, "Make inquiries! look for a
needle in a bundle of hay!" Yet, nevertheless, sent off his letters. On
the whole, nothing had so agitated and disturbed the Colonel for years.
He pictured to himself the lingering hope of being yet sought after and
aided, which would dwell in the youth's mind unawares: he imagined the
hope sickening, the expectation failing: he thought of the bitter
enlightenment, which has ceased to believe in words and promises,
growing round the boy: he felt his own word losing its meaning, and his
own earnest desire frustrated. Then, unable to keep silence, in spite of
his reticence as host, he spoke to Sir John on the subject. Sir John
made light of his troubles: "My dear fellow, what can they do with a
batch of new recruits in a week--three weeks, is it? Very well, then,
three weeks; what do you suppose could be done in that time? Besides,
have you any certainty that troops are being sent abroad at all? I
don't know of any; and for the Queen's service, you know, I ought to be
almost a better authority than yourself. No, no, have patience--we'll
hear from the boy presently, I have not the slightest doubt of it. Give
him up?--no, not a bit! but a little knocking about will do him
good--always does young men good! If you look so very serious, I shall
believe you want to get rid of me."
This last address was unanswerable. The Colonel closed his lips with a
sigh. As for his own influence, from which he at one time hoped a good
deal, he found it conclude in a courteous letter and a ready promise.
The Colonel was extremely discomfited and discouraged; for the first
time in his life he repented of kindness. Had he, after all, "raised
expectations which could never be realized?" The matter gave him a great
deal more pain than Sir John could have thought possible. _He_, with all
the carelessness of a man who has commonly found the world go well with
him, put this affair aside lightly. Why should anything happen to
disconcert their plans? As soon as the boy should turn up he was ready
and eager to help him. He had no apprehension of any romantic
_contretemps_, such as the Colonel feared; such things only occurred in
very rare cases. What harm could it do to wait?
Thus still another week passed on. A month after hearing from Roger,
Colonel Sutherland found another letter on his breakfast table; it was
dated "Ship 'Prince Regent,' in the Downs, March 21st." With a gasp of
excitement the Colonel ran his eyes over it, and then thrust it into the
hand of Sir John, who was calmly eating his breakfast. The baronet
started, read it over, jumped from his seat, and called for his man in a
voice of thunder. Then he flew to a writing-table which stood in one
corner, wrote something hurriedly in gigantic characters, shouting aloud
at the end of every word for "Summers! Summers!" Summers made his
appearance hastily, amazed and fluttered by the imperative demand.
"Fly!--horseback, railway, anything that's quickest--telegraph-office,
Edinburgh! To be sent this instant; return directly; here's your money;
I tell you, fly!" cried the excited baronet.
Summers made an astonished bow, looked at the paper, and demanded where?
His master took him by the shoulders and thrust him out of the door,
following him through the rain along the garden, and shouting,
"Telegraph-office, Edinburgh!" in his ear, with sundry stimulating
expletives. Then Sir John returned much more slowly. He found the
Colonel marching about the room, very grave, and very much excited.
"It's not your fault, old fellow," said the baronet, hastily "bolting,"
to use his own expression, the remainder of his breakfast; "here's the
man that's to blame; come down upon _me_, it'll do you good. I don't
give this up yet. How's the wind? Dead south-west for a miracle--can't
go a step down the Channel in a sou'-wester! Come along--put up your
traps, brighten your grave face, and let's be off by the first train!"
"We'll be too late!" said the Colonel, whose mortification and distress
were great.
"Not a bit of it," said Sir John. "Telegraph reaches the ship in
half-an-hour--'Young man, Roger Musgrave, enlisted among the troops on
board the "Prince Regent," to be detained. To the officer in command.'
We shall be there by noon to-morrow all right. Why do you suppose now
that Fortune should make up her mind to spite us? Why shouldn't the wind
stay for twenty-four hours in that quarter, and all be well?"
"Why, indeed?" said the Colonel, with a sigh; "why should not everything
serve our caprice when we lose the true opportunity, and then make a
fictitious one?--but they don't, Armitage. I shall never forgive myself;
however, while there is still a hope let us go."
For the Colonel's fears had been literally fulfilled. Roger had enlisted
in a regiment about to sail for the Cape, where there was at present
raging one of the many Caffre wars. He wrote to take leave of his
friend, believing well to be out of reach before any late succour could
reach him. A certain shade of proud and forlorn melancholy was in his
farewell. The young man felt to his heart a pang which he would not
confess--he had been taken at his word.