"Or—Ormond?"
"That's his rather high-flown name. Curious fellow. I like him—or try to. I've an odd idea he doesn't like me, though. Funny, isn't it, how a man goes out of his way to win over a nobody whom he thinks doesn't like him but ought to? He's an odd crab," he added.
"Odd?" Her voice sounded so strange to her that she tried again.
"Why do you think him odd?"
"Well, he is. For one thing, he will have nothing to do with others of his mess or troop or squadron, except a ruffianly trooper named Burgess; consequently he isn't very popular. He could be. Besides, he rides better than anybody except the drill-master at White Plains; he rides like a gentleman—-and looks like one, with that infernally cool way of his. No, Ormond isn't very popular."
"Because he—looks like a gentleman?"
"Because he has the bad breeding of one. Nobody can find out anything about him."
"Isn't it bad breeding to try?"
Hallam laughed. "Technically. But a regiment that elects its officers is a democracy; and if a man is too good to answer questions he's let alone."
"Perhaps," said Ailsa, "that is what he wants."
"He has what he wants, then. Nobody except the trooper Burgess ventures to intrude on his sullen privacy. Even his own bunky has little use for him. . . . Not that Ormond isn't plucky. That's all that keeps the boys from hating him."