They have a "State Railway" now in Tirhoot, but at the time I am writing of there was only one pukha road in all the district. The ladies travelled in palanquins, or palkis, as they are more familiarly called. It is a long journey from Bankipore to Segowlie, and three nights were spent in travelling. Bluff old Minden Wilson stood on the bank above the ghât to welcome Mrs. Freeze across the Ganges. One day was spent at young Spudd's factory, the second at the residence of a genial planter rejoicing in the quaint name of Hong Kong Scribbens; on the third morning they reached Segowlie. But still no Martell; only a chit to say that that plaguy juice was still running but that he hoped to be able to drive over to dinner. Miss Davidson went to bed in a huff; and Major Freeze was temporarily inclined to think that her home-trip had impaired his good lady's amiability of character.
Martell did turn up at dinner-time. But he was hardly a man at any time to create much of an impression, and on this occasion he appeared to exceptional disadvantage. He was stutteringly nervous; and there were some evidences that he had been ineffectually striving to mitigate his nervousness by the consumption of his namesake. He wore a new dress-coat which had not the remotest pretensions to fit him, and the bear's-grease which he had freely used gave unpleasant token of rancidity. The dinner was an unsatisfactory performance. Miss Davidson was extremely distraite, while Martell became more and more nervous as the meal progressed and was manifestly relieved when the ladies retired. Soon after they had done so the Major was sent for from the drawing-room. He found Miss Davidson sobbing on his wife's bosom. He asked what was the matter. The girl, with many sobbing interruptions, gasped out—
"He's the wrong man! O Heavens, I never saw him before! The man I remember who gave me sweets when I was a child had black hair; he has red! Oh, what shall I do? Oh, please send that man away and let me go home!"
And then Miss Davidson went off into hysterics.
Here was a pretty state of matters! The Major and his wife could not see their way clear at all. Consultation followed consultation, with visits on the Major's part to poor Martell in the dining-room irregularly interspersed. It was almost morning before affairs arranged themselves after a fashion. The new basis agreed upon was that the previously existing arrangement should be regarded as dead, and that a courtship between Martell and Miss Davidson should be commenced de novo—he to do his best to recommend himself to the lady's affections, she to learn to love him if she could, red hair and all. And so George went home, and the Segowlie household went to bed.
Poor George at the best had a very poor idea of courting acceptably; and surely no man was more heavily handicapped in the enterprise prescribed him. He had to court to order, and to combat, besides, both the bad impression made at starting and the misfortune of his red hair. The poor fellow did his best. He used to come and sit in Mrs. Freeze's drawing-room hours on end, glowering at Miss Davidson in a silence broken by spasmodic efforts at forced talk. He brought the girl presents, gave her a horse, and begged of her to ride with him. But the great stupid fellow had not thought of a habit and the girl felt a delicacy in telling him that she had not one. So the horse ate his head off in idleness, and George's heart went farther and farther down in the direction of his boots. He had so bothered Mrs. Freeze that she had washed her hands of him, and had bidden him worry it out on his own line.
In less than a month the crisis came. Miss Davidson could not bring herself to think of poor George as affording the makings of a husband. She told Mrs. Freeze so, and begged, for kindness sake, that the Major would break this her determination to Mr. Martell and desire him to give the thing up as hopeless. The Major thought the best course to pursue was to write to George to this effect. Next morning in the small hours the poor fellow turned up in the Segowlie veranda in a terribly bad way. He would not accept his fate at second-hand in this fashion; he must see Miss Davidson and try to move her to be kind to him. In the end there was an interview between them, from which George emerged quiet but very pale. His notable matrimonial bandobast had proved the deadest of failures; and the poor fellow's lip trembled as he thought of Mactavish's happy home and his own forlorn bungalow.
But although he had red hair and did not know in the least what to do with his feet, George Martell was a gentleman. The lady continuing anxious to go home, he insisted on his right to pay her return passage as he had done her passage outward, urging rather ruefully that, having taken a shot at happiness and having missed fire, he must be the sole sufferer. It is a little surprising that this uncouth chivalry did not melt the lady, but she was obdurate, although she let him have his way about the passage money. So in the company of an officer's wife going home Miss Davidson quitted Segowlie and journeyed to Bombay. Poor old George, with a very sore heart, was bent on seeing the last of her before settling down again to the old dull bachelor life. He dodged down to Bombay in the same train, travelling second class that he might not annoy the girl by a chance meeting; and stood with a sad face leaning on the rail of the Apollo Bunder, as he watched the ship containing his miscarried venture steam out of Bombay harbour on its voyage to England.
The same night he set out on his return to his plantation. At near midnight the mail-train from Bombay reaches Eginpoora, at the head of the famous Bhore ghât. Some refreshment is ordinarily procurable there, but it is not much of a place. George Martell had had a drink, and was sauntering moodily up and down the platform waiting for the whistle to sound. As he passed the second class compartment reserved for ladies he heard a low, tremulous voice exclaim, "Oh, if I could only make them understand that I'd give the world for a cup of tea!" George, if uncouth, was a practical man. His prompt voice rang out, "Qui hye, ek pyala chah lao!" Promptly came the refreshment-room khitmutghar, hurrying with the tea; and George, taking off his hat, begged to know whether he could be of any further service.
It was a very pleasant face that looked out on him in the moonlight, and there was more than mere conventionality in the accents in which the pleasant voice acknowledged his opportune courtesy. Insensibly George and the lady drifted into conversation. She was very lonely, poor thing; a friendless girl coming out to be governess in the family of a burra sahib at Chupra. Now Chupra is only across the Gunduck from Tirhoot, so George told his new acquaintance they were both going to nearly the same place, and professed his cordial willingness to assist her on the journey. He did so, escorting her right into Chupra before he set his face homeward; and he thenceforth got into a habit of visiting Chupra very frequently. Need I prolong the story? I happened to be in Bankipore when the Prince of Wales visited that centre of famine-wallahs. It fell to my pleasant lot to take Mrs. Martell in to dinner at the Commissioner's hospitable table. Mrs. Mactavish was sitting opposite; and I went back to my bedroom-tent in the compound without having made up my mind whether she or Mrs. Martell was the prettier and the nicer. So you see George Martell did not make quite so bad a bandobast after all.