“But if it’s not like anything but Egypt, how would I say it was?” she demanded triumphantly. “Tell me now, Brian—this place which I mustn’t say is like Egypt, whereabouts in it do we live?”
“Ah, not here, I tell you! Sure the new town is a mile out. The General was to send horses for you, that you mightn’t be delayed while they landed your own. He wanted to puckerow [commandeer] a side-saddle from one of the ladies in Cantonments, but I told him you’d be just as happy with a stirrup thrown over a man’s saddle, and he listened to me for once.”
Eveleen was quite satisfied, but her husband was not, unless his expression belied him. The horses were duly waiting, and she flew into the saddle with all the ease of past disgraceful experience—so Brian declared,—to the great interest of her fellow-passengers. It would have been too much to expect Richard to be pleased at this unconventional method of travelling, but she did think he need not have muttered something that sounded like “Circus tricks!” as he gathered up the reins and put them into her hand. When Brian had directed the servants where to go, they rode out of the town—which looked more than ever like one of those deserted cities one reads of in the Nearer East, uninhabited, but as habitable as it ever was. As the sun neared the horizon, however, the inhabitants began to show themselves lazily at their doorways, and children came scrambling over the rubbish-heaps, on which everything seemed to be built, to stare at the riders. Beyond stretched a sea of sand dotted with tombstones, which seemed to extend as far as eye could reach, and then they came suddenly upon a great cantonment, with solid houses covered with shining chunam, and gay with rows of bright-coloured chiks, and long ranges of “lines,” large enough to accommodate several regiments.
“Somebody’s folly!” remarked Brian sententiously, pointing with his whip. “They’ll have sunk a pretty penny in building this big place, and it’s said the neighbourhood ain’t healthy, though we haven’t found anything wrong with it as yet. This way, Evie!”
Passing two sentries, they rode into a compound which was a miniature of the desert without—so wide was it and so sand-swept,—with an enormous house at the far end, like a small town in itself. The chiks were being drawn up now that the heat of the day was over, and on the verandah stood a small spare figure with grey beard blowing about in the breeze.
“Why, there’s my old lad—loose!” said Brian, much perturbed. “I hope he’ll not have been getting into mischief. Stewart will be certain to say ’twas my fault. But I ask you, could I have locked him into the office, and told Munshi to sit on him? That’s the only thing would really keep him quiet. Happily there’ll be three of us to look after him next week, if his nephew who’s on sick leave turns up all right. Now what has he been after, I wonder?”
“Welcome, a thousand times welcome, Mrs Ambrose!” cried Sir Harry, hobbling with perilous haste down the steps. “These young fellows call this place a desert, but it blossoms like the rose to-night. Allow me!” he lifted her paternally from the saddle. “Oh, fie, fie! what an uneasy journey you must have had on that contrivance! Ambrose, I am very glad to see you. Plenty to do, believe me—start to-night. But first we’ll have dinner—at once.”
“I beg your pardon, General, but ’twas not to be for an hour yet,” put in Brian.
“Don’t trouble yourself about that, my lad. I have put it forward an hour—bustled the cook a bit.” The General’s voice was happy and triumphant. “Knew your sister would be starving. It’s coming in now.”
“Ah, Sir Harry, but you’ll let us have a second to make ourselves respectable and get the sand off?” urged Eveleen.