"How did I enjoy it? How could I do anything else but enjoy it, wid the young lady talkin' to me, and askin' me questions about me experiences in the wars, an' about the camp and the hospital at Keelung; and the two bright eyes of her lookin' at me so friendly loike. Fwhat kind of a man wud I be that wudn't enjoy it?"
"So the young lady talked to you all the way home?" said McLeod.
"Yes," said Gorman with a wink at McLeod, which distorted all one side of his face, "she didn't know that I was a married man."
McLeod laughed gaily at Sinclair. The latter took Gorman's banter good-naturedly. He could afford to be indulgent.
"How did Carteret take your monopolizing her?" he asked.
"He tould me that it wud become me to have less to say in the prisince of me betters. 'Begorra,' sez I, 'barrin' her young ladyship here, there's none of them prisint that I can see,' sez I. 'An' whin it comes to savin' young ladies from General Soon's Tamsui Blues, be the powers I haven't been seein' me betters around here, exceptin' Docther Sinclair, may the angels make his bed in glory,' sez I. Wid that the young lady fires up and sez, 'The divil a bit of it,' sez she. 'We don't want the doctor to go to glory yet,' sez she."
"What! What! What's that, Gorman!" exclaimed McLeod, while Sinclair was fairly shrieking with laughter. "You don't mean to tell us that Miss MacAllister said that—'the divil a bit of it.' Did she say that?"
"Och, Mr. McLeod, now you're spoilin' me story. If she didn't say that in so manny wurrds, she thought it annyway. An' fwhat's the difference? But I'll take me affydavit on it that she did say that she didn't want the docther here to go to glory yet. An' I'm jist tellin' the docther for his comfort, for be that sign, they were very encouragin' wurrds."
"Did Carteret try to sit on you again?" inquired Sinclair when they ceased laughing.
"He did. 'Sergeant,' sez he, 'you're too free with your tongue. Your company is offensive,' sez he. 'You may consider your services dispensed with. And I shall consider it my duty to report you to the consul.' 'Bedad,' sez I, 'if you had been a little freer wid your courage, you wudn't have needed me company. As for me services,' sez I, 'I'm not under your orders. I was sint to see this young lady safely home,' sez I. 'An' I cudn't think of lavin' her in your care, for fear you might chanst to meet a fieldmouse by the way, an' you moight run, an' lave her to be devoured by the feroshus wild beast,' sez I.