“Nay, Ted, don’t ask me. I don’t get shoals of letters in feminine handwriting.”
Ted turned red, laughed, and changed the subject.
“This reads very funnily now. They write to say how glad they are that Delhi has fallen, and that Jim and I escaped without harm, and they suppose that by now the fighting will all be over.”
He opened the second envelope, and Alec winked at Claude, who raised his eyebrows enquiringly.
“Surely it ain’t?” said he, rising quickly to the joke; and Ted looked up in feigned bewilderment.
“Of course it is,” Alec answered. “Don’t he look rapturous?”
“And so young!” murmured Claude.
“Yes; he cut me out too. She preferred the colour of his hair, and fancied that she detected more signs of a moustache.”
Alec dodged, as Ted most irreverently threw a bishop at his head, and resumed:
“A nice little girl too, daughter of one of our officers. Does she send any message for me, Ted?”