"And you'll permit me to say, sir," roared the General, whose eyes were protruding from his head, "that my plan will be carried out if every pestilent political in Granthistan is opposed to it. It's high time you came back to duty, sir. You seconded subalterns think no small beer of yourselves, I know, but you'll learn better here, I can tell you, and you'll find---- Eh, what's that?" An unobtrusive aide-de-camp was presenting a paper at his elbow, and as he read it his face changed, but by no means cleared. "Hum--ha!" he muttered, "it seems you have some fancy status here--political trick, I suppose--some quibble about Habshiabad lying outside Granthistan. But it's all one. If you ain't under my command, you don't get mentioned in my despatches--see? Eh, how does that suit you, sir?" "I am honoured by the omission, sir," said Gerrard. [1] Prestige. [2] Native force under European leadership. CHAPTER XXII. THE TRIUMPH OF THE DEAD. The siege of Agpur was in full swing, the big guns battering at the walls from a distance, while the trenches crept nearer and nearer to the outlying suburbs. Nisbet and Cowper still slept in their desecrated grave in the precincts of Ratan Singh's tomb, not because the mind of General Speathley had yielded in the least to Gerrard's arguments, but on account of the opportune arrival of the ammunition for which the army had been waiting, and which enabled active work to begin at once. A chilly neutrality reigned between the Brigadier and the officer accompanying the Habshiabad troops, who saw as little as possible of one another, finding it advisable to communicate through a third person. This was usually Charteris, who stood aghast when he found what a gulf had been established between them. "If it had been me to go into a passion and use insubordinate language, no one would have wondered," he lamented. "But you, Hal--who have barely lost your temper three times in your life! And on a mere matter of sentiment, too!" "Didn't you yourself accuse me of a tendency to the sentimental?" "That was in an affair in which it was more or less natural. But when it comes to being cut out of despatches for the sake of a dead blackfellow----! Seriously, old boy, it may be bad for you in the future." "You know as well as I do whether mention in despatches would have the slightest weight with a certain lady if she cared for a man. And if she didn't, what in the world does it signify losing it?"