The Warden of the Marches

by Sydney C. Grier

The words were loud enough for Dick to hear, and Mabel saw him frown angrily as she returned to her place, half-proud and half-afraid of her triumph. He said nothing, however, but took his stand immediately behind her, the very embodiment of silent displeasure. The sense of his disapproval served to irritate her further, and she heartily wished him away. His rigid face would quite spoil the effect of the picture she had intended to present, and he was taking up the room of other people whose attendance she would have preferred. But she was determined not to give in, even when the Commissioner’s encouraging smile smote her with a feeling of treachery, in that she had appealed to him against Dick.

The regimental prize-winners came up in their order, the natives, now that the momentary excitement was over, wearing a look of stately boredom, which seemed to declare that sports and prizes alike were a species of child’s play, in which they took part merely to humour the unaccountable whims of their officers. With the officers it was different, for Mabel read in their faces that although sports were good, and to earn a prize was better, both these faded into insignificance compared with the joy of receiving that prize from her hand. This was the very feeling that it most pleased her to inspire, and she loved the “boys,” as she called them in her thoughts, better than before, if that were possible.

But this glow of pleasure was shortlived. A brief pause followed the appearance of the Sikh head-man to receive the tug-of-war prize, and Mabel felt, without turning her head, that Dick’s silent disapproval had infected all the Englishmen around. Once more she hardened her heart. It was detestable to see this wretched racial snobbishness in the men she had admired so much. They would have liked to spoil the whole affair, and deprive her of the one piece of romance which had come to brighten the humdrum proceedings, rather than allow a native not belonging to the regiment to carry off a prize. She, at least, was above such petty considerations, and Bahram Khan should receive as gracious a smile as any of his fellow-competitors. One other person was of her mind, she saw, for the Commissioner clapped his hands lightly, and with infinite condescension, as Bahram Khan swaggered up. Mabel stepped forward, and met the glance of the bold eyes under the green turban. As she did so, she understood suddenly the secret of Dick’s displeasure. The smile faded from her lips, and the hand in which she held the Keeling Cup trembled. She stopped and faltered, and her pause of distress was evident to the men behind her. How they responded to her mute appeal she could not tell, but the look of insolent admiration disappeared from Bahram Khan’s eyes, into which she was still gazing spell-bound, and was, as it were, veiled under his former expression of contemptuous indifference towards his surroundings. A few words from the Commissioner, and the Nalapur Prince retired, leaving behind him a general feeling of awkwardness. If it had been arranged that anything else was to be done at this point, no one remembered it. People stood about in little groups, and talked somewhat constrainedly. Something had happened, or rather, there had been an electrical instant, and something might have happened, but it was not quite easy to see what it was. The crudest conception of the facts was voiced by Mrs Hardy, who had torn herself from her school-work to be present at the prize-giving, and now seized upon Georgia.

“MABEL STEPPED FORWARD, AND MET THE GLANCE OF THE BOLD EYES UNDER THE GREEN TURBAN”

“Oh, dear Mrs North, how unspeakably painful all this must be to you and your husband! You must feel the charge of Miss North a dreadful responsibility. I would never have said a word while she flirted merely with our own officers, or even with Mr Burgrave—though really the lengths to which she goes—! But to set herself deliberately to dazzle a native——”

“Mrs Hardy,” cried Georgia, flushing angrily, “please remember that you are speaking of my sister. I am certain that Mabel has never dreamt of such a thing. She may be thoughtless, but that is all.”

“It is very sweet and good of you to say it, but I am afraid your eyes will soon be disagreeably opened. No rational being could doubt that Miss North is setting her cap at the Commissioner, and that would hardly be a match you could welcome, would it? Look at her dress—so absurdly unsuitable at her age. Oh, I know to a day how old she is, Mrs North, and I will say that eight years between you don’t warrant your dressing as if you were mother and daughter. But I grant that Miss North is one of the people who always look younger than they are, while you invariably look older.”

The expression of Mrs Hardy’s sympathy rarely corresponded with the good-will which prompted it, but Georgia received the stab in heroic silence, and cast about for some means of changing the subject.

“I suppose we may as well go home now,” she said at last in despair, rising as she spoke. “Where is my husband, I wonder?”