"We've been thinking it over, and we're going to see if we can't work up some better music now. Never you mind about Wilkins; his bark's worse than his bite." "And he likes to show off," said another. "Wants people to think what a clever one he is. We'll have some quiet practices together, if you like." "I shall be very glad," said Dick eagerly. "That's right, and you can give us a few hints. Wilkins turned nasty through that snubbing he got over yonder, at the mess-room, but he'll soon come round. I'm sorry, though, about old Jones." "So am I," cried Dick; "I quite felt for him this afternoon." "Yes, he never ought to have been put to music. I hope he won't turn nasty," said the first speaker, "for he's got a temper of his own. But, there, you needn't mind him." "No," thought Dick, "I need not mind him; but I don't like making enemies, all the same." CHAPTER EIGHTEEN. DICK FINDS A PUPIL. "No one would know me now," said the recruit to himself one morning as he glanced at his face in a piece of looking-glass, for the military barber had been operating upon his head, and had--as the _Punch_ man said in the hot weather in allusion to his hair--"cut it to the bone." For the first time Richard Frayne dressed in his tightly-fitting, stiff uniform. "Hallo, Flutey!" said one of the men; "I was looking for you. Got 'em on, then?" "Yes," said Dick, smiling. "Do they fit?" "Oh, yes, pretty tidy. Feel all right?" "No; I don't think I can get my hand up level with my mouth, and the tunic feels as if it would split up the back, and the buttons go flying, the first time I move." "Oh, that'll be all right. Sure to feel a bit stiff at first. I say, he has padded you out well in the chest and over the shoulders." "Yes, far too much." "Not a bit of it. Makes you look broader-chested and square-shouldered--more of the man. But, here, Lieutenant Lacey wants you up at his quarters. Sent that chuckle-headed Joe Todd, his servant, to fetch you directly." "What does he want?" cried Dick, aghast with the idea that something had been found out. "Go and ask him." "But I must change first." "Nonsense! Go as you are. You've got to wear the red now," added the man, with a grin. Dick went down into the barrack yard, to find the lieutenant's servant waiting, and followed him, with the peculiar tremor increasing, and a cold, dank perspiration breaking out about his temples and in the palms of his hands. A few minutes after he was ushered into the handsomely-furnished rooms which formed the lieutenant's quarters; and he felt a pang shoot through him for the moment as the piano in one corner, and some music and a flute upon the table, recalled his own rooms at Draycott's. But his thoughts were back directly to his troubles, and he felt a kind of momentary relief on finding that there was no one in the sitting-room.