I fancied she colored slightly, but quickly recovered.
"Dear old Sparkley," she said sweetly; "he WAS a champion liar!"
II.
A PRIVATE'S HONOR
I had not seen Mulledwiney for several days. Knowing the man—this looked bad. So I dropped in on the Colonel. I found him in deep thought. This looked bad, too, for old Cockey Wax—as he was known to everybody in the Hill districts but himself—wasn't given to thinking. I guessed the cause and told him so.
"Yes," he said wearily, "you are right! It's the old story. Mulledwiney, Bleareyed, and Otherwise are at it again,—drink followed by Clink. Even now two corporals and a private are sitting on Mulledwiney's head to keep him quiet, and Bleareyed is chained to an elephant."
"Perhaps," I suggested, "you are unnecessarily severe."
"Do you really think so? Thank you so much! I am always glad to have a civilian's opinion on military matters—and vice versa—it broadens one so! And yet—am I severe? I am willing, for instance, to overlook their raid upon a native village, and the ransom they demanded for a native inspector! I have overlooked their taking the horses out of my carriage for their own use. I am content also to believe that my fowls meekly succumb to jungle fever and cholera. But there are some things I cannot ignore. The carrying off of the great god Vishnu from the Sacred Shrine at Ducidbad by The Three for the sake of the priceless opals in its eyes"—
"But I never heard of THAT," I interrupted eagerly. "Tell me."
"Ah!" said the Colonel playfully, "that—as you so often and so amusingly say—is 'Another Story'! Yet I would have overlooked the theft of the opals if they had not substituted two of the Queen's regimental buttons for the eyes of the god. This, while it did not deceive the ignorant priests, had a deep political and racial significance. You are aware, of course, that the great mutiny was occasioned by the issue of cartridges to the native troops greased with hog's fat—forbidden by their religion."