When quartered in cantonments, in the first year of their marriage, not far from Hurdwar on the Ganges (where Allan got the idol he gave to Olive) there seemed to be no more loving and attached couple than Duncan Cameron and his little wife Alice, and both were prime favourites with the garrison; he, for his fine bearing which made him the pattern officer of his regiment--a Bengal Infantry corps--his skill in horsemanship, as a marksman and pigsticker, and his general _bonhomie_ and good nature. She, for her beauty and sweetness, her great abundance of animal spirits, and a charming _espièglerie_ that made her the object of attention from all. Ladies were scarce in these cantonments so far 'up country,' and thus Alice proved a wonderful attraction to all the young subs at the band-stand, or on the racecourse, and elsewhere; and they hovered about her rather more than Duncan Cameron quite relished. She was a leading feature at all the entertainments given by Sir Bevis Batardeau, G.C.S.I., the brigadier, and his wife; and indeed no ball, picnic, or dance was deemed complete without the presence of Alice Cameron. Now, Sir Bevis was a notorious old _roué_, and the cause of much 'gup,' as scandal or gossip is called in India. He was a middle-aged man of fashion, grizzled and rather bald, with a reddish nose and wicked eyes, while Lady Batardeau, his senior by a year or two, was a kind and motherly woman, who loved Alice dearly; and 'gup' of course asserted that the General did so too, in a fashion of his own, and many things were said that never reached as yet the ears of Duncan Cameron. The latter was sent to some distance from the cantonments on a particular duty, and poor Alice was left to mope in her bungalow alone. 'I often thought,' she said, 'if anything should ever separate us, I would die. The fear smote me like a sword's point, Evan, and the night Duncan left me a jackal howled fearfully in the compound. Was it ominous of evil? I fear so--for separated terribly we were fated to be, through no fault of mine.' These forebodings made her pass sleeplessly the hot and breathless Indian nights while hourly the cantonment _ghurries_ were clanged, and the jackals howled in the prickly hedges, and the mosquitoes seemed a thousand times more annoying--no chowrie would whisk them out of the muslin curtains; and her breakfast seemed so insipid now, and Gunga Ram, the _khansa-man_, or native butler, could find nothing to tempt her appetite; yet Gunga, though, like most Hindostanees, doubtful of the virtue of every European woman, was devoted to his own particular _mehm Sahib_.