In the few days succeeding Hugh Johnstone’s still unsuspected departure, the dull fires of a growing jealousy burned and smouldered in Captain Harry Hardwicke’s agitated heart. The old nabob had neatly slipped away in the night, on a special engine, and the Captain heard all the growing tattle of Delhi, as to the social activity at the marble house. The open hospitable board of General Willoughby rang with the very wildest rumors. Alan Hawke seemed to be the “Prince Charming” of the hidden festivities. Hardwicke, on the eve of his Majority, now darkly moped in his rooms, undecided to apply for a long home leave, unwilling to leave Delhi, and even afraid to ask his general for any positive favor as to a future station. Club and mess bandied the freest tattle as to old Hugh Johnstone’s lovely “importation.” Men eyed the prosperous Major Alan Hawke on his rising pathway with a growing envy. There was a smart coterie who now firmly believed that the Major’s only “secret business” was to marry the Rose of Delhi, and then, departing on an extended honeymoon, leave the “Diamond Nabob,” as the ci-devant Hugh Fraser was called, free to proclaim Madame Berthe Louison, queen of the marble house, and sharer of his expected dignity, the crown of his life, the long-coveted Baronetcy. When old Major Verner growled: “That’s the scheme, Hardwicke! My Lady of France makes the condition that the young heiress shall be settled first. Gad! What a lucky dog Hawke is!” Then, Harry Hardwicke suddenly discovered that he loved the moonlight beauty of his dreams--the fair veiled Rose of Delhi. Hawke rose up as a darkly menacing cloud on his future. His morning rides were now but keen inspections of the Commissioner’s garden, and, lingering on the Chandnee Chouk, he knew, by experiments, conducted with a beating heart, just where Justine Delande was wont to wander in the lonely labyrinth, with her lovely young charge. A low double gate, a break in the high stone wall, often gave him glimpses of the two women in their morning rambles and, with a softened feeling, born of her own secret passion for Hawke, Justine Delande watched a fluttering handkerchief often answer Captain Hardwicke’s morning salute. “Tell me, Justine,” said Nadine, the morning after Hugh Johnstone had stolen away, “Why does my father not ask Major Hardwicke to visit us? He is to be promoted for his superb gallantry, he is so brave--so noble! He certainly has as many claims to honor as this--this Major Hawke--whom my father has made his confidant. I don’t know why, but I don’t like that man!” “What do you know of Major Hardwicke, as you call him?” cried Justine in wonder at Miss Nadine’s growing interest.