The shrewd common-sense of the advice silenced Charteris's murmurs, and he faced with less outward rebelliousness the prospect of a week or two at Ranjitgarh. This was a mere interlude before plunging again into the main current of battle. The Governor-General was coming to the Granthi capital to take counsel with the Commander-in-Chief as to the further course of the war, which had not hitherto been conducted with conspicuous success, and the honours for the Agpur campaign were to be conferred. The cantonments and the Residency were full, and Brevet-Major Charteris, C.B., was glad to share his former restricted quarters with Gerrard. The Edmund Antonys were in occupation of the house again, James Antony and his wife retiring into two rooms of the main block, while Lady Cinnamond was once more at Government House. With her had come down from the hills Marian Cowper, a sorrowful figure in the heavy weeds then worn by even the youngest widows, but taking up the burden of life again bravely. If she still shrank from Honour, it was only they and their mother who could perceive it. Sir Arthur Cinnamond arrived from the front with the Commander-in-Chief for a week about Christmas time, and it so happened that Gerrard came suddenly upon Honour riding with her father the day after his arrival. She wore a habit made like the uniform of Sir Arthur's famous Peninsular regiment--a fashion which probably owed its vogue to the semi-military costume adopted by the young Queen Victoria for reviews. Civilian ladies--whose husbands had no uniform to be copied--called it fast, or at least 'spirited,' (Gerrard had heard Mrs James Antony animadverting upon it only that morning,) but the severe lines of the coat suited Honour well in combination with the long trailing skirt and the broad hat with its drooping feather. As he rode up to the pair, and noted the serious face and the firm lines of the mouth, it struck Gerrard as curiously ironical that to a girl of this type should have fallen such a prolonged period of indecision as Honour had undergone between the claims of Charteris and himself. The thought was still in his mind when she glanced round and saw him, and the change in her face was like the waking into life of a statue. The lines softened, the eyes dropped, and a wave of crimson flooded forehead and cheeks. Sir Arthur shouted a hearty welcome to Gerrard, commanded him to dinner that evening, to meet his eldest son, who was on the Headquarters Staff, and turned judiciously to speak to some one else. Honour's eyes were on her horse's mane, Gerrard's were devouring her face, but for the moment both of them were tongue-tied. Honour recovered herself first, and spoke with a desperate effort.