“Oh!” with a blank stare of surprise. “But why don’t you know?”
“I was not aware that I had said I did not know. The information is within the reach of any one possessed of an ordinary school atlas.”
“Oh, Sir Dugald, you say such funny things! But why are you going?”
“Because I am sent,” returned Sir Dugald, shortly, for he wished to return to his conversation with his hostess and Georgia. But the snub failed of its effect.
“Oh yes, of course. But what are you going to do there?”
With a sigh Sir Dugald resigned himself to answer the demands of this persistent young lady, and pushing his plate from him, arranged a plan with dessert forks and spoons.
“This space represents Ethiopia,” he said, “and this biscuit will show you roughly the position of Kubbet-ul-Haj, the capital. The country has been touched by European commerce only on its borders, but it contains vast grain-producing districts and enormous mineral wealth, which only needs being worked. Hence it offers a wide field for the employment of capital, as well as a practically untouched market for manufactured goods. For these reasons, and also on account of its situation, the great European powers all take a friendly interest in it, more especially Scythia and Neustria. Neustrian influence approaches it very closely on one side, and the Scythian sphere on another, but its eastern boundary is conterminous with our Khemistan Frontier, about which Major North or Miss Keeling could tell you a good deal more than I can. Unauthorised, or, at any rate, unrecognised and semi-private expeditions from all three countries have tried to reach Kubbet-ul-Haj, but have failed, and the King has always refused to receive a diplomatic mission, the object of which would be, of course, to conclude a commercial treaty. We have always contended that we had the best right to open up Ethiopia to European trade, and of course our being actually on the frontier gives us a start in the race. But just lately we gained a new advantage, for Rustam Khan, the King’s eldest son, who had been sent to put down a rising among the tribes near our frontier, fell in with one of our surveying parties, and took a great fancy to the officers. The errand on which he had been sent was a kind of honourable banishment, for it seems that he and the Grand Vizier are always at daggers drawn, and that the King sympathises with the Vizier, but when he was summoned back to Court he must have managed to gain his father’s ear again, for friendly overtures were made by the King to the Khemistan authorities for the settlement of some trifling boundary dispute. Unofficial journeys were made to Kubbet-ul-Haj by two or three of our frontier officers, and the last brought back word that the King would be willing to receive a mission and to enter into an alliance. Negotiations have since taken place, and preliminaries been arranged, and our business now is to conclude the treaty embodying the various provisions which have practically been agreed to on both sides—in the rough, of course. And I really must apologise,” said Sir Dugald in conclusion, “for the way in which I have been boring every one, but it is Miss Hervey’s commendable desire for information that is to blame.”
“I didn’t know that you were acquainted with the Khemistan Frontier,” said Dick to Georgia, under cover of the buzz of conversation which succeeded to the enforced silence.
“Although my father lived and died there?” asked Georgia, with a little resentment in her tone.
“What a fool I am! To think that I should have forgotten, even for a moment, that General Keeling was your father! Why, it was that which originally drew me to the Warden of the Marches—I mean—er—” Dick stumbled and hurried on—“well, I have worshipped him ever since I first went out. He is our patron saint out there in Khemistan, you know?”