Frank could hardly conceal his annoyance, though it was sad to reflect that after all he had no right to be angry. Loyal enough still to revere the flag he had deserted, he answered somewhat stiffly.
"Sir Henry looks very high for his daughter, and I should think Miss Hallaton herself would be more fastidious, more difficult to please, than most people."
Picard seemed in no way disconcerted. A life of adventure soon produces a habit of underrating difficulties, and a tendency to risk all for the chance of winning a part. I am not sure but that a spice of this kind of recklessness is appreciated by women, and that "nothing venture, nothing have," is a maxim which holds good in love, quite as much as in other affairs of life.
"Oh! I could get on well enough with the old man," said he; "there's a freemasonry amongst fellows of his stamp and mine. I consider Sir Henry quite one of my own sort, and, indeed, I've sounded him. Well, perhaps I can hardly say sounded him on the subject, but hinted to him that he and I might do a smartish stroke of business if we put our money and our brains together, and played a little into each other's hands. It's the girl that beats me, Captain; that's where I'm at sea. She's got a high-handed way with her that I can't make head against at all, and I'm not easily dashed, far from it. The young woman's uneasy in herself, too. There's something on her mind. I saw it from the first. The best thing she can do, in my opinion, would be to marry some smart, likely young chap, who would take her abroad for a spell till her colour came back, and the nonsense was driven out of her head. I should like to be him uncommon! But I don't see my way."
There was much of bitter to Frank in this simple, confidential talk, dashed, nevertheless, with a something of sweet and subtle poison, that ought to have warned him he had no right to pledge himself to one woman while he could thus be affected by the mere name of another. Strange to say, he felt that Picard now constituted a link between himself and that past life which after to-day must be put out of sight for ever, and he clung to the Confederate officer accordingly.
"You'll come to luncheon at the barracks, of course," said he, throwing the end of his cigar out at the window. "I must be there till five or six o'clock to parade my young horses for the Colonel. Why he wants to see them to-day I don't know, considering he bought them all himself, and a very moderate lot they are. But, anyhow, there I shall be till five at the earliest."
"Luncheon," repeated Picard reflectively; "I don't care if I do. I'm generally peckish about two o'clock, and Britishers do dine unnaturally late. I'll go and see the boy first, come back to feed with you, and take a look at the young horses afterwards. How long now, Captain, do you estimate that it takes to get a trooper fit for duty?"
"How long?" repeated the other, who could be eloquent on this congenial theme. "Why, two years at the very least. And even then half of them are not properly mouthed for common field movements, certainly not for parade. Why, I've seen a squadron of Austrian cuirassiers march off at a walk, every horse beginning like a foot soldier with his near leg, and I don't know why our cavalry should be worse drilled than theirs. One of my troop was actually run away with last year at a review, and I felt as much ashamed as if he had run away in action! No; what I want is to see more rides and fewer foot-parades, the men less bothered and the horses better broke."
"Well, you do take an unconscionable time over everything in this old, slow, and sure country," answered Picard. "Why, if we'd wanted two years, or two months either, to get our cattle fit for service, none of Stuart's best things would have come off at all. In ten days, Captain, ten days at most, I'd every horse in my squadron as steady as a time-piece, and as handy as a cotton-picker. I wish I could have shown you 'Stonewall.' I called him 'Stonewall' after Jackson, you may be sure. A great, slapping chestnut, sixteen hands high, and up to carrying two hundred pounds weight. Before I'd ridden him a week he'd lift a glove like a retriever, and walk on his hind legs like a poodle. I could tell you things of that horse that I'll defy you, or any man to believe! I was riding him on the twenty-first of——Halloo! here we are at Slough. What a queer old woman, hobbling along the platform! Now, that's the sort of figure you wouldn't see from one end of the States to the other. Where do you suppose they raised her, and what do you think she is?"
"Somebody's aunt, I should say," answered Frank carelessly, hardly vouchsafing a glance, as the train moved on; and Miss Ross drew a long breath of relief to find herself safe and undiscovered at Slough Station, within a few miles of her boy.