"But consider that beastly schedule of the day's work that you've been explaining to me!"
"What's wrong with it?" asked Lieutenant Prescott patiently.
"What's first—what did you call it?"
"First call to reveille, at 5.50 in the morning?"
"Yes; what an utterly impossible time for any gentleman to be out of bed. Unless," added Algy with a sudden bright thought, "he stays up until then, and goes to bed after the beastly row is over."
"That would hardly do, I'm afraid," Lieutenant Prescott laughed softly. "You see, the day is full of duties. Now, sharp at six the march——"
"March? At six in the morning?" gasped Algy Ferrers, his despair increasing by leaps and bounds. "Man alive, I wouldn't feel like crawling—at that time!"
"The term has confused you," replied Prescott. "It's the musician of the guard—the bugler—who plays the march. It's a strain that is played, the first note beginning just as the reveille gun is fired, at the minute of six in the morning. Then, just five minutes later reveille itself is blown."
"All that racket will wake me up mornings," complained Algy sadly.
"It ought to, for it's an officer's business to be up by that time."