"Cuthbert is dead. He was drowned bathing last August."
Charles broke down, and cried like a child. When he was quiet, he asked after William.
"He is very well, as he deserves to be. He gave up everything to hunt you through the world and bring you back. Now, my dear old boy, do satisfy my curiosity. What regiment did you enlist in?"
"In the 140th."
He paused, hid his face in his hands, and then his speech became rapid and incoherent.
"At Devna we got wood-pigeons, and I rode the Roucan-nosed bay, and he carried me through it capitally. I ask your pardon, sir, but I am only a poor discharged trooper. I would not beg, sir, if I could help it, but pain and hunger are hard things to bear, sir!"
"Charles--Charles! Don't you know me?"
"That is my name, sir. That is what they used to call me. I am no common beggar, sir. I was a gentleman once, sir, and rode a-horseback. I was in the light cavalry charge at Balaclava. An angry business. They shouldn't get good fellows to fight together like that--"
The next morning, old Lady Ascot, William, Mary, and John Marston were round his bed listening to his half-uttered, delirious babble. The anxious question was put to the greatest of the doctors present. "My dear Dr. B----, will he die?"
"Well, yes," said the doctor. "I would sooner say 'Yes' than 'No'--the chances are so heavy against him. You must really prepare for the worst."