"Your recollection is quite accurate."
"Who was to blame?"
"The lady said that I was."
"Was it true?"
Robert Anstruther, late captain of Bengal Cavalry, rose to his feet. He preferred to take his punishment standing.
"The court-martial agreed with her, Miss Deane, and I am a prejudiced witness," he replied.
"Who was the—lady?"
"The wife of my colonel, Mrs. Costobell."
"Oh!"
Long afterwards he remembered the agony of that moment, and winced even at the remembrance. But he had decided upon a fixed policy, and he was not a man to flinch from consequences. Miss Deane must be taught to despise him, else, God help them both, she might learn to love him as he now loved her. So, blundering towards his goal as men always blunder where a woman's heart is concerned, he blindly persisted in allowing her to make such false deductions as she chose from his words.