"It looks dreary enough now, but just you wait till next year," said John Raby, in his cheerful confident way. "The new dam will be finished, I hope, the water will come in at high level to the garden, the place will be a paradise of flowers, and we shall be dividing thirty per cent, profit! There's a prospect! Oh, by the way, did I ever tell you that beast Shunker Dâs came down just after you did, Marsden, expecting to find me on my back like a turned turtle? His face, when he saw I was jolly as a sand-boy, was a caution! By George! that man does hate me and no mistake." Belle moved a step nearer her husband and laid her hand on the back of his easy-chair. Perhaps it was only his good-nature in leaving her free to nurse Philip, but somehow she felt they had drifted far apart during the past six weeks. "I seem to have heard nothing," she began, wistfully. "Better employed on the head of the firm, my dear," he replied with a laugh. "You do her credit, Marsden. And now I must be off again, for there is some idiotic fuss at a village a few miles off. Shunker's work, I expect; but we are too strong for him. Even the native recognises the almighty dollar, and if they will only have patience, I'll engage to treble the revenue of this district. Well, good-bye, Belle. I'll be back to-morrow or next day. Soon as I can 'get,' as the Americans say. Take care of yourselves." When he had gone the punkah went on swinging, Belle's hands knitted busily, Philip's lay idle in the languor of convalescence; all was as before, and yet there was a difference--a difference of which each was conscious, and which brought a certain restraint. "Why does Shunker hate him?" asked Major Marsden.