‘It is settled, and in the way to please you best, I feel sure. You shall continue in the calling you have chosen, my brave boy. It must and shall be so. I have not many years to live, but I pray God will spare me until I see you righted I hope, but at any rate on the high road to fame.’
She kissed him tenderly on the forehead, as if to sign the agreement thus.
‘But you will not leave me just yet,’ she said, almost piteously. ‘He need not go back to the regiment directly, Colonel Greathed?’
‘Certainly not; not till October, when we embark for Gibraltar again. I shall want him to take the adjutancy then.’
[CHAPTER VI.]
BACK ON THE ROCK.
As October approached, and with it the time for rejoining his regiment, Herbert became more and more eager and excited. He was quite angry with himself for being so pleased. It seemed such base ingratitude to Lady Farrington to be so delighted to leave her. But he was not that in the least. He felt an increasing regard for her which promised to develop some day into deep affection. He was only overjoyed at the prospect of once more resuming his work. Those who have been long in regular harness can best realize how flat, stale, and unprofitable is life without a fixed object and employment, more or less constant, from morning till night. Neither by inclination nor by his recent training was Herbert of the sort to eat the bread of idleness, or be satisfied with having nothing to do. Therefore it was, that when his adieux were made, and the poor old lady left to her solitary grief, Herbert returned to soldiering with all the vigour and elasticity of a steel spring, which has been set free. He could never forget all he owed his first patron and firm friend; he meant to spend a certain portion of his time with her still; he would go to her always gladly and with the utmost alacrity, when she expressed a wish to see him or desired to have him at her side. But in spite of all, he was like a schoolboy just released from school. The expiration of his leave and his return to duty, which is to some officers such an inexpressible bore, was to him a source of the most unfeigned delight.