"With every male patient marrying every nurse, and living happily ever afterwards. There wouldn't be enough nurses, my dear aunt, to go around. And because Muriel has been so good as to attend to me during my illness is a reason why my admiration should increase, but it gives no excuse for assuming that she is bound to become my wife."
"Then, I suppose, we must hunt about for someone else likely to suit your lordship."
"A waste of time," he assured me. "I shall never think of caring for anyone else. And to have been in her company all these weeks is a privilege I did not deserve, and shall never forget."
"Boy," I cried, "you're talking like a blessed Crusader."
An army medical officer came to see him one day, and announced that Herbert was not yet fit to return to duty. Herbert took him down to the riverside, by the Naval College, and argued with him for an hour by the clock, and they came back to Gloucester Place, where the medical officer said that Lieutenant Millwood's health had so much improved that he would rejoin his company the following morning. I knew quite well that Herbert would have been less eager to go away from Greenwich if his lady had not now been catching the eight-twenty train every morning to Cannon Street. It had always interested me to watch folk who are in love, and this, perhaps, was due to the circumstance that until the Quartermaster-Sergeant came on the scene, I had few experiences of my own to engage attention. And being accustomed to pull wires and see the figures obey, I was a trifle moody in bidding the lad farewell.
"No more railway accidents, please," I directed. "I did think this one might have been of some use, but I was mistaken. And I'm disappointed."
"Had a letter from the railway company this morning," he said. "They seem to make a very fair offer."
"Give it to me. You mustn't accept the proposal until I have considered it."
"If you were in command of the British army, aunt—"
"I like everything to be done right."