But to shew you how a man’s heart changes about when it is blown by the hot breath of what you may call love, let me tell you that only half a minute later, I was disappointed again at not going; and dared I have left the ranks, I’d have run after the departing column, for I caught Harry Lant looking up at that window, and I thought a handkerchief was waved to him.
Next minute, Captain Dyer calls out, “Form four-deep. Right face. March!” and he led us to the gateway, but only to halt us there, for Measles, who was sentry, calls out something to him in a wild excited way.
“What do you want, man?” says Captain Dyer.
“O sir, if you’ll only let me exchange. ’Taint too late. Let me go, captain.”
“How dare you, sir!” says Captain Dyer sternly, though I could see plainly enough it was only for discipline, for he was, I thought pleased at Measles wanting to be in the thick of it. Then he shouts again to Measles, “’Tention—present arms!” and Measles falls into his right position for a sentry when troops are marching past. “March!” says the captain again; and we marched into the market-place, and—all but those told off for sentries—we were dismissed; and Captain Dyer then stood talking earnestly to Lieutenant Leigh, for it had fallen out that they two, with a short company of eight-and-thirty rank and file, were to have the guarding of the women and children left in quarters at Begumbagh.
Story 1—Chapter VII.
It seemed to me that, for the time being, Lieutenant Leigh was too much of a soldier to let private matters and personal feelings of enmity interfere with duty; and those two stood talking together for a good half-hour, when, having apparently made their plans, fatigue-parties were ordered out; and what I remember then thinking was a wise move, the soldiers’ wives and children in quarters were brought into the old palace, since it was the only likely spot for putting into something like a state of defence.
I have called it a palace, and I suppose that a rajah did once live in it, but, mind you, it was neither a very large nor a very grand place, being only a square of buildings, facing inward to a little court-yard, entered by a gateway, after the fashion of no end of buildings in the east.