Poor lad—would he? At least he thought so.
Long, long did Denzil lie awake that night, after leaving the mess-bungalow, anticipating the meeting of the morrow, and recalling the expression of Rose's clear brown eyes—the touch of her soft hand and her whispered words, while the hungry jackals howled like devils in the compound without; and while, on the metal ghurries of the adjacent cantonment, the sentinels struck the passing hours.
He might, had he known the true state of matters, had a sympathetic adviser in Bob Waller, who at that precise time was seated thoughtfully in his quarters—the white-washed room already described—with a leg over each arm of his bamboo chair and his eyes fixed pensively on the ceiling, for he was thinking over Mabel's rare beauty through the medium of a soothing pipe of Cavendish; and once or twice he muttered:
"I am quite bewildered—gobrowed, as the Niggers here have it—and know not what to think—matrimony or not." And, as the night stole on, foreseeing little or nothing of the dangers and horrors to come—of the cloud of battle that was gathering in the Khyber Pass,
"He smoked his pipe and often broke
A sigh in suffocating smoke."
CHAPTER VII.
"THE BAND PLAYS AT TWO."
Young though he was, Denzil made a careful toilet next day; mufti was not much worn at Cabul; but he was unusually particular about the fitting of his blue surtout with its gold shoulder-scales, the adjustment of his crimson sash and sword-belt, forgetting that these were no novelties to the eyes of Rose, and that the black livery of the Civil Service finds more favour with ladies than military uniform in India, where the Redcoats are frequently at a discount, with mammas especially; and he was on the large circular parade ground, where the bands usually played, in the centre of the cantonments (which were an oblong enclosure measuring a thousand yards by six hundred, with a circular bastion at each corner) long before the general promenaders began to assemble, or the European musicians of the 54th Native Infantry had assorted their music, and performed those preliminary grunts on the trombone and ophicleide, which excited the astonishment of the natives, who were present in considerable numbers, by their aspect and costume, enhancing in piquancy a very remarkable scene.
For the first time since they had met, Rose Trecarrel had made a regular appointment with him. It was in a very public place, however, and though it seemed simple enough to her, to Denzil the idea that he had established a secret understanding with her, was in itself happiness; and for the first time he wished to avoid his friend Waller, and was pleased to find that he was detailed for guard that day at an old tomb and temple where we had a post, at the foot of the Behmaru Hills.
The day was one of great beauty, and the air was delightfully cool. Overhead spread the blue and unclouded vault of Heaven, and in the rarified atmosphere, even the remote details of the vast landscape and of the city were rendered visible. Viewed from the cantonments, the plains of Lombardy do not exceed in beauty and brilliance of colour those of Cabul, which moreover, in lieu of the Apennines (amid which Denzil and his parents had often resided) are overshadowed by the stupendous mountains of Kohistan.