'Oh, do come in,' replied the lady. 'I want to ask you why you were not on duty yesterday.' Captain W. coloured up, mumbled something, and was about to ride on his way, when his old tormentor, Gunthorpe, came up. After saluting the lady, he said to W.: 'Going to the artillery lines, are you? So am I. We'll ride there together.' So, raising their caps to the lady, they were about to start, when G. said: 'But isn't this a _moving spectacle_?' pointing to the tiles piled up on the ground. 'Whatever it is,' said W., again getting red in the face, 'it's no fault of mine.' 'I say,' said Mrs. G., 'it's nothing of the kind. I'm not thinking of moving--don't imagine any such thing--yet, after all, in another sense, it may be termed "a moving spectacle," inasmuch as it is most likely to move a good many rupees into my pocket. So you see, Captain Gunthorpe, that I have very good reason to be obliged to the Colonel and your friend Captain W.' The lady and Captain G. were both convulsed with laughter; the latter, after a second bow, rode off with the Staff-Captain, who observed to G., 'You and the lady seem to understand the joke; I confess I can't see it.' 'Can't you? how odd!' said G., again bursting into a fit of laughter. Captain W. was sulky and silent, and little was said during their ride. When they reached the artillery lines, G. asked his silent friend to breakfast with him at the mess; but W. declined, stating he had yet to visit the canteen. So the gentlemen parted, and G. regaled his friends at mess with what he had seen and heard that morning. Not to protract the story longer than needful, it is enough to say that the lady held out three months longer, during two changes in the state of her roof, which was first open on the north side and then on the south. She raised internal entrenchments of bamboo mats and cajans, which last she had to send some distance for. By these means, and the moving of her bed from this to that side as she found convenient, she defended herself against wind and rain and cold and sun most effectually; and though, as she observed, the polite attentions of her friends enabled her to converse with the stars more freely than she had been accustomed to do, she made no sign of capitulating; no white flag was seen on her battlements. She seemed, indeed, more active than ever. She drove out morning and evening, and whenever she met the Colonel or the Staff-Officer she saluted in the most obliging manner.