“Yes,” he goes on, “I am very fond of her, and—and I suppose my papa is very fond of her, too.” Being a trifle upset by this, I polished away at the captain’s sabre for a minute or so, and even then I could only say: “Yes, sir; nat’rally, sir, of course.” For the truth were as things had been getting worse and worse, and the tiffs had been growing into rows—rows as couldn’t go on without being heard in a bungalow, where walls was thin and rooms not over far from each other. And what he had heard the Lord only knows, but it had been a-workin’ in his innercent mind and troubling him, and he was coming to me for comfort, and that I saw in his fine, loving, wistful black eye, and in his handsome little chin, as was not quite steady. “Yes, of course, he is very fond of her,” he said, “and she is very fond of him; because people who are married—people who are married always are, aren’t they, Rabbett?” “Ah, sir,” says I, “that they are; there ain’t nothin’ like it.” “No,” he says, his little face trying to keep itself steady, “and I’m very glad of—of that—I’m very glad of that.” And quite sudden he faces round and walks off, a-holding his head up like a field officer. But well I knowed why he’d gone. Something had hurt his little heart and set him to thinking, so that he could not manage his looks even before Rabbett. And, gentleman as he was, he was not willing to let it be known what his child’s trouble was. When the family began to grow up the regiment was ordered back to England; and I came back with them, you see. The captain was not rich, and as the family expenses got bigger, year by year, money got scarcer with him, and they couldn’t live as they did before; and so, somehow—I think it was because I liked the children, and especially my young master—I fell into a way of being part valet, part waiter, part man-of-all-work for the captain and his. That wasn’t all. The captain’s fine way—for he was handsome still, and a gentleman born, and no mistake—brought him fine friends; and his fine friends brought him debt, because he was obliged to keep up with them. Everything was badly managed, because Mrs. Dalgetty, as I said, knew nothing about managing; so the servants ran wild, and were nothing but trouble and expense, and there were nothing but struggling to keep up, and threatening to break down, from day to day. “The captain is worse than ever,” Mrs. Dalgetty would say, sometimes, when things looked bad, and she had a crying fit on. “And Rose is so expensive, and the other girls are growing up. I wish Lionel was older. He is the only one who seems to feel for me at all.” The real truth were, as Lionel were that sweet-natured he felt for them all; and I must say as they couldn’t help being as fond of him in their way as he was of them in his.