"It's w'ot I say all along," reiterated the romancer of G Company. "It begun ever since Joey Smith was took from us at Number Two camp. It's 'is ghost--that's w'ot it is. 'Is ghost layin' in a _trew-so_. Jest you look 'ere! They bury 'im, didn't they? as 'e was--decent like in coat and pants--no more. Well! since then 'e's took 'is rifle off us, an' a greatcoat off D Company, and a knapsack off A." "Don't be lavin' out thim blankets he tuk from the store, man," interrupted the tall Irishman. "Sure it's a testhimony to the pore bhoy's character annyhow that he shud be wantin' thim where he is." "It is not laughing at all at such things I would be, whatever," put in another voice seriously, "for it is knowing of such things we are in the Highlands--" "Hold your second sight, Mac," broke in a third; "we don't want none o' your shivers tonight. You're as bad as they blamed niggers, and they swear they seen Joey more nor once in a red coat dodging about our rear." "Well! they won't see 'im no more, then," remarked a fourth philosophically, "for 'e change 'is tailor. Leastways, 'e got a service khakee off Sergeant Jones the night afore last; the Sergeant took his Bible oath to 'ave it off Joey Smith's ghost, w'en 'e got time to tackle 'im, if 'e 'ave ter go to 'ell for it." Major Griffiths meantime was having a similar say as he stood, eye-glass in eye, at the door of the mess-tent. "Whoever the thief is," he admitted, with the justice common to him, "he appears to have the instincts of a gentleman; but, by Gad, sir, if I find him he shall know what it is to take a field officer's gaiters." Whereupon he gave a dissatisfied look at his own legs, a more contented one at the glimmering stars of the enemy's watchfires, and then turned in to get a few hours' rest before the dawn. But some one a few miles farther down the valley looked both at his legs and at the stars with equal satisfaction. Some one, tall, square, straight, smoking a pipe--some one else's pipe, no doubt--beside the hole in the ground where, on the preceding night, the camp flagstaff had stood. That fortnight had done more for George Afford than give his outward man a trousseau; it had clothed him with a certain righteousness, despite the inward conviction that Peroo must be a magnificent liar in protesting that the _Huzoor's_ outfit had either been gifted to him or bought honestly. In fact, as he stood looking down at his legs complacently, he murmured to himself, "I believe they're the Major's, poor chap; look like him somehow." Then he glanced at the Sergeant's coatee he wore and walked up and down thoughtfully--up and down beside the hole in the ground where the flagstaff had stood. So to him from the dim shadows came a limping figure. "Well?" he called sharply. "The orders are for dawn, _Huzoor_, and here are some more cartridges." George Afford laughed; an odd, low little laugh of sheer satisfaction. * * * * *