‘But, sir, I can never keep up a commission in a regiment like this. I have nothing but my pay.’
‘You have me, Jack. I am a miserable old bachelor having no one to care for. I am going to adopt you as my son, and in return for what you have done for me I intend to leave you my fortune.’
Jack was overwhelmed. ‘My mother and sisters, how are they?’ he asked presently.
‘All well, and, by Jove, aren’t the girls handsome? You’ll open your eyes when you see them, young man, for they must have altered much in the last two years.’
‘I hope soon to see them,’ said Jack.
‘We start to-night,’ said Colonel Harrington. ‘I have just arranged with your colonel here, and I have got you two months’ leave. There are clothes, uniform, and all sorts of things to see to, settlements to make, and I don’t know what, all of which we must go to London to do.’
That night Jack dined for the first time in the officers’ mess, and as he entered in his sergeant’s uniform he received a magnificent reception.
They caught the night train, and at noon next day arrived in London. Jack did, indeed, stare with surprise at the handsome, elegant young ladies who stood beside his mother; he could hardly believe they were his sisters, so much had they altered, and they stared in surprise at the tall, broad, bronzed soldier, with the glittering medals and the incipient moustache.
But when Mrs Blair hung round his neck and sobbed out her thanks that her dear boy had been preserved to her amidst all the terrible dangers he had passed through, he knew that at least she had not changed.
The Lelands were there to welcome Jack, who noticed that his now fellow-officer Captain Leland, who had gone home on leave directly he had arrived in Ireland, kept very close to Molly, and that they seemed very pleased with one another. And the way in which Colonel Harrington beamed on them all did Jack’s heart good.