He rang; ordered an eye-opener, stiff; swallowed it, and looked at his watch. Eight; never mind; he would wash and shave; then decide between breakfast and pic-nic. Thanks to his martial education he was a rapid dresser, and it still lacked a quarter of nine when he appeared in the dining saloon. He had time therefore to eat a mutton chop, but he only looked at it with a disgusted eye, his stomach being satisfied with a roll and a cup of coffee. In the outer hall he lighted a segar, but after smoking about an inch of it, threw the rest away. It was decidedly one of his qualmish mornings, and he was glad to get a full breath of out of door air.
"Is my hamper ready?" he said to one of the hall-boys.
"Sir?"
"My hamper, confound you;" repeated the Lieutenant-Colonel, who was more irritable than usual this morning. "The basket that I ordered last night. Go and ask the clerk."
"Yes, sir," said the boy when he returned. "It's all right, sir. There it is, sir, behind the door."
The omnibus, a little late of course, appeared about a quarter past nine. Besides Colburne it contained three ladies, two of about twenty-five and one of thirty-five, accompanied by an equal number of beardless, slender, jauntily dressed youths whom the Lieutenant-Colonel took for the ladies' younger brothers, inferring that pic-nics were family affairs in New Boston. Surveying these juvenile gentlemen with some contempt, he was about to say to Colburne, "Very sorry, my dear fellow, but really don't feel well enough to go out to-day," when he caught sight of Miss Ravenel.
"Are you going?" she asked with a blush which was so indescribably flattering that he instantly responded, "Yes, indeed."
Behind Miss Ravenel came the doctor, who immediately inquired after Carter's health with an air of friendly interest that contrasted curiously with the glance of suspicion which he bent on him as soon as his back was turned. Libbie hastened into the omnibus, very much afraid that her father would order her back to her room. It was only by dint of earnest begging that she had obtained his leave to join the pic-nic, and she knew that he had given it without suspecting that this sherry-loving army gentleman would be of the party.
"But where are your matrons, Mr. Colburne?" asked the doctor. "I see only young ladies, who themselves need matronizing."