'Poor Mr. Fitzgerald, he has been unlucky. And I suppose if anything were to go wrong when he was there you would have to take notice of it. How dreadful for him! Perhaps, after all, it would be better for George to go back. One would need to be omnipotent to carry out all one's kindly impulses, wouldn't one, Colonel Tweedie? And we women are so helpless.' He leant forward and laid his hand close to hers as it rested on the framework of the _dandy_. 'Unless you have a stronger arm at your disposal, as you have now--my dear lady--if only for your kindness to my daughter, and, as you say, young Keene is not quite the thing. Besides--I--I mean you--I mean there are privileges which----' What those privileges were remained unexplained, though Gwen, no doubt, had a shrewd guess at them, for, just at that moment Dalel Beg, having no fear of Departments before his eyes, came swaggering up in a bright-green velvet coat. 'Aha, you here! Hi, you kitmutghar, bring me champagne cup. Jolly, Tweedie, ain't it?' The Colonel's face belied the proposition, but the new-comer was not one of those who look for support to surroundings; he was a law unto himself only. 'You see I wear swagger clothes like you, Mrs. Boynton. Rajah Sahib old-style man, so I come as native of India to please him. He is neighbour, Mrs. Boynton, by Hodinuggur, down waste-water canal cut. You give him water, sir, he give you lakhs on lakhs.' This time the Colonel's expression was a study, but Gwen, despite her usually keen sense of the ludicrous, did not add a smile to the Mirza sahib's crackling laugh. 'I regret,' began the head of the Department loftily, but Dalel's mind was full of one thing only, and that was himself; his immense superiority over the Rajah Sahib, his equality with the sahib-logues. 'Hi, kitmutghar. _Ai, soor ke butcha kyon nahin sunté ho?_ (Ah, son of a pig, why don't you listen?) _Ek_ glass curaçoa. Cup what you call hog-wash, eh, Tweedie? Rajah, poor chap, know nothing about cup. Khansamah do him in the eye, hee, hee! Poor old chappie. Gone home to do poojah and have baths. What rot!' 'Will you take me to get a cup of coffee?' said Gwen hastily to Colonel Tweedie. 'I won't trouble you to bring it here; it spills so in the saucer and then it drops over one's best frock.' The courteous excuse for escape, which came quite naturally to Gwen's lips, pleased neither of her companions. The gracious instinct prompting it, which to Colonel Tweedie seemed uncalled for, was totally lost on the Mirza. He scowled after her, and muttering something as he tossed off the curaçoa, went off to bestow his favours elsewhere. A minute or two afterwards, George Keene ran up to the empty _dandy_ and pushed something under the cushion.