'Then you can! Ah! Colonel Tweedie, if you would! He really isn't fit to go down, and Mr. Fitzgerald, who is as strong as a horse, could easily stop at Hodinuggur. He wouldn't like it, of course, but it won't hurt him. Only----' She paused, looked at her companion, and shook her head gravely.
'Only?' echoed her elderly admirer, his heart, which had melted like wax at her cavalier mention of Dan, stiffening again at what might be consideration for that most ill-advised person.
'Only George won't consent to that, I'm afraid. He has such a ridiculous attachment to Mr. Fitzgerald. And I suppose it would be quite impossible to leave the place even for a few days without a really first-class man in charge. What a comfort it must be for you to have officers on whom you can rely, like Mr. Fitzgerald.'
Colonel Tweedie gave his little preparatory cough. 'No doubt, no doubt. At the same time, I am not aware that Mr. Fitzgerald's presence--er--is so--er--indispensable. The fact is, my dear Mrs. Boynton, that, owing--er--to previous occurrences, we were anxious to keep him out--er--out of the responsibility as much as possible. In fact, but for his own request I should not--er--have arranged for him to take Mr. Keene's work at all. To refuse, however, would have--er--given rise to--er--unfounded comment, and so----'
She interrupted his halting mixture of dignity and desire to be at once considerate and captious with a sigh.
'Poor Mr. Fitzgerald, he has been unlucky. And I suppose if anything were to go wrong when he was there you would have to take notice of it. How dreadful for him! Perhaps, after all, it would be better for George to go back. One would need to be omnipotent to carry out all one's kindly impulses, wouldn't one, Colonel Tweedie? And we women are so helpless.'
He leant forward and laid his hand close to hers as it rested on the framework of the dandy. 'Unless you have a stronger arm at your disposal, as you have now--my dear lady--if only for your kindness to my daughter, and, as you say, young Keene is not quite the thing. Besides--I--I mean you--I mean there are privileges which----'
What those privileges were remained unexplained, though Gwen, no doubt, had a shrewd guess at them, for, just at that moment Dalel Beg, having no fear of Departments before his eyes, came swaggering up in a bright-green velvet coat.
'Aha, you here! Hi, you kitmutghar, bring me champagne cup. Jolly, Tweedie, ain't it?' The Colonel's face belied the proposition, but the new-comer was not one of those who look for support to surroundings; he was a law unto himself only. 'You see I wear swagger clothes like you, Mrs. Boynton. Rajah Sahib old-style man, so I come as native of India to please him. He is neighbour, Mrs. Boynton, by Hodinuggur, down waste-water canal cut. You give him water, sir, he give you lakhs on lakhs.'
This time the Colonel's expression was a study, but Gwen, despite her usually keen sense of the ludicrous, did not add a smile to the Mirza sahib's crackling laugh.