Hilda looked up from the papers she had been busy with as he entered—in fact made a guilty and trepidatious attempt at sweeping them out of sight, which suggested a weakness entirely foreign to her.
“Well, how are things going?” she asked gaily.
“Things are going quite right. We have that pestiferous mullah, Hadji Haroun, safe by the heels, and Mushîm Khan has cut out of all further part in the jihad. That’s good enough to begin with.”
“Yes—and you? You know, you must get removed from here. The blood feud will overtake you sooner or later.”
“No, I think not. I believe Mushîm Khan was wound up by that sweep of a mullah. Now he only remembers what I did for his son. And he has done nothing beyond what he did to me individually, and Murad Afzul is dead, so the Government will not be hard on him, and things will be as they were.”
“Yes. And who has he—who have we all got to thank for that? Herbert, had you no thought for me, when you put yourself into their power again? If I could not get you out of it before, could I again, do you think?”
“Darling, it was because I had every thought for you that I worried along at the official business for all I knew how. I wanted to straighten out the muddle they’d be sure to put down to me. And now I believe I have.”
“Yes, indeed, you have.”
“And the stir and work knocked me together again, and all that fever has cleared out of my system. I can never forget what an abject invalid I was, just when I ought to have been taking care of you.”
“Can’t you? But I can, and have.”