"Get away! you d----d black devil," he muttered, with a sort of listless anger. "Can't you let me die in peace, you fool? Can't you let me die in the gutter, die in a bad-character suit? It's all I'm fit for--all I'm fit for." Voice, anger, listlessness, all tailed away to silence. He turned away with a sort of sob, and straightway fell asleep, for he was still far from sober. Peroo lit a cresset lamp and stood looking at him. Beauty was certainly vain here, and if the Lord was going to repay, it was time He began. Time some one began, at any rate, if the man who had fought for him, Peroo, was not to carry out his desire of dying in the gutter--dying in a bad-character suit! The latter misfortune could, however, be avoided. Things were going cheap in the bazaar that evening, as was only natural when it was to be deserted for six months at least, so it ought not to be hard to get the master an exchange for something more suitable to his beauty, if not to his death. Five minutes afterwards George Afford, too much accustomed to such ministrations to be disturbed by the process of undressing, was still asleep, his chin resting peacefully on Peroo's best white cotton shawl, and the bad-character suit was on its way to the pawnshop round the corner. It was nigh on an hour, however, before Peroo, having concluded his bargain, came back with it, and by the light of the cresset set to work appraising his success or failure. A success certainly. The uniform was old, no doubt, but it was a corporal's; and what is more, it had three good-conduct stripes on the arm. That ought to give dignity, even to a death in the gutter. Peroo brought out some pipeclay and pumice-stone from a crevice, and set to work cheerfully on the buttons and belts, thinking as he worked that he had indeed made a good bargain. With a judicious smear of cinnabar here and there, the tunic would be almost as good as the master's old one--_plus_ the good-conduct stripes, of course, which he could never have gained in the regiment. But out of it? If, for instance, the Lord were really to repay Private George Afford for that good deed in defending a poor lame man?--a good deed which no bad one could alter for the worse! Peroo on this point would have been a match for a whole college of Jesuits in casuistry, as he laid on the pipeclay with lavish hand, and burnished the buttons till they shone like gold. It was grey dawn when George Afford woke, feeling a deferential touch on his shoulder. "_Huzoor!_" came a familiar voice, "the first bugle has gone. The _Huzoor_ will find his uniform--a corporal's, with three good-conduct stripes--is ready. The absence of a rifle is to be regretted; but that shall be amended if the _Huzoor_ will lend a gracious ear to the plan of his slave. In the meantime a gifting of the _Huzoor's_ feet for the putting on of stockings might be ordered."