... so you must take your husbands. It is our trick. Nature her custom holds Let shame say what it will: when these are gone The woman will be out.--_Hamlet._ |OF course,” said Lottie, as she stood by the side of Oswin Markham when the small steamer which had been specially engaged to take the field-officers of the Bayonetteers over the dreaded bar of Durban harbour was approaching the quay--“of course we shall all go together up to Pietermaritzburg. I have been there before, you know. We shall have a coach all to ourselves from Durban.” She looked up to his face with only the least questioning expression upon her own. But Mr. Markham thought that he had made quite enough promises previously: it would be unwise to commit himself even in so small a detail as the manner of the journey from the port of Durban to the garrison town of Pietermaritzburg, which he knew was at a distance of upwards of fifty miles. “I have not the least idea what I shall do when we land,” he said. “It is probable that I shall remain at the port for some days. I may as well see all that there is on view in this part of the colony.” This was very distressing to the young lady. “Do you mean to desert me?” she asked somewhat reproachfully. “Desert you?” he said in a puzzled way. “Ah, those are the words in a scene in your part, are they not?” Lottie became irritated almost beyond the endurance of a naturally patient soul. “Do you mean to leave me to stand alone against all my difficulties, Mr. Markham?” “I should be sorry to do that, Miss Vincent. If you have difficulties, tell me what they are; and if they are of such a nature that they can be curtailed by me, you may depend upon my exerting myself.” “You know very well what idiots these Bayonetteers are,” cried Lottie. “I know that most of them have promised to act in your theatricals,” replied Markham quietly; and Lottie tried to read his soul in another of her glances to discover the exact shade of the meaning of his words, but she gave up the quest. “Of course you can please yourself, Mr. Markham,” she said, with a coldness that was meant to appal him. “And I trust that I may never be led to do so at the expense of another,” he remarked. “Then you will come in our coach?” she cried, brightening up. “Pray do not descend to particulars when we are talking in this vague way on broad matters of sentiment, Miss Vincent.” “But I must know what you intend to do at once.” “At once? I intend to go ashore, and try if it is possible to get a dinner worth eating. After that--well, this is Tuesday, and on Thursday week your entertainment will take place; before that day you say you want three rehearsals, then I will agree to be by your side at Pietermaritzburg on Saturday next.” This business-like arrangement was not what Lottie on leaving Cape Town had meant to be the result of the voyage to Natal. There was a slight pause before she asked: