Georgia’s face flushed as she stirred her coffee deliberately. She had no wish to risk the lives of the whole party by insisting on delay, but it was not Dick’s place to say so for her. It looked as though he had no confidence in her, that he should not allow her even the semblance of a choice, and confidence was what she demanded above all things. It flashed upon him presently, noticing her silence, that he had hurt her, and he bent towards her to say in a low voice-- “I say, Georgie, you don’t mind much, do you? Are you awfully keen on the little beast? I’ll buy you dozens when we get to Khemistan. But you wouldn’t have us waste time now?” “You have quite put it out of my power even if I wished it,” returned Georgia, coldly; and Fitz, at the other side of the makeshift table, was filled with a sudden and violent hatred against Dick. It was not the first time that this feeling had entered his mind--in fact, it merely slumbered intermittently, and awoke whenever Dick and Georgia had a difference of opinion, no matter which side was in the right. Fitz had no desire to quarrel with Georgia’s choice, for his loyalty was too unquestioning to admit a doubt of her wisdom in the matter; but that the highly-favoured man who was honoured by the love of this peerless lady should be so blind to the grace bestowed upon him as actually to contradict and even to bully her (this was Fitz’s rendering of what he saw) was only an awful illustration of the depths to which human depravity could descend. At such times as this all the boy’s faculties were on the alert to render some service, however great or small, to his lady, which might assure her that even though Major North possessed no due sense of the overwhelming privileges she had granted to him, there were others who still counted it an honour to be able to anticipate her least wish. It is slightly pathetic to be obliged to record that Georgia accepted his good offices without at all appreciating the sentiment from which they sprang--indeed, so ungrateful is human nature that, had she discovered it, she would probably have rejected them with contumely, and poured out the vials of her wrath on the head of the luckless youth who dared to criticise Dick--and that she valued the slightest attention from her lover far above all that Fitz could offer, in spite of the much greater disinterestedness of the latter’s endeavours. But this only proved to Fitz more clearly still her excellence, as exemplified by her absolute loyalty to the man of her choice, and stimulated him to continue to render his unselfish services.