That night he watched the weary soldiers digging graves for their fallen comrades, and, while his brain was torn with conflicting problems, a spy brought news that the powerful Gwalior Contingent was marching to seize Cawnpore. He hesitated no longer. As a general he had no right to be swayed by emotion. He must protect Cawnpore as a base and trust to the fortune of war that Lucknow might keep the flag flying. Malcolm was with him when he formed this resolution. Outwardly cold, Sir Henry seemed to his youthful observer, who now knew him better, to resemble a volcano coated with ice. "Major," he said, "the column will retreat at daybreak. But I will get my other aides to make arrangements. Are you quite recovered from your wound? Are you capable of undergoing somewhat severe exertion, I mean?" Frank answered modestly that he thought he had never been better in health or strength, though he wondered inwardly what sort of exertion could be more "severe" than his experiences of the preceding three weeks. But Havelock knew what he was talking about, as shall be seen. "I want you to make the best of your way to Delhi," he said in his unbending way. "I leave details to you, except that I would like you to start to-night if possible. Of course any kind of escort that is available would be fatal to your success, but, if I remember his record rightly, that servant of yours may be useful. I do not propose to give you any despatches. If you get through tell the Commander-in-Chief in the Punjab exactly how we are situated here. Tell him Lucknow will not be relieved for nearly two months, but that I will hold Cawnpore till the last man falls. I hope and trust you may be spared to make the journey in safety. If you succeed you will receive a gratuity and a step in rank. Good-by!" He held out his hand, and his calm eyes kindled for a moment. Then Frank found himself walking to his tent and reviewing all that this meant to Winifred and himself. He was none the less a brave man if his lips trembled somewhat and there came a tightening of the throat that suspiciously resembled a sob. Two months! Could a delicate girl live so long in another such Inferno at Lucknow as he had seen in Wheeler's abandoned entrenchment at Cawnpore? "God help us both!" he murmured bitterly, passing a hand involuntarily over his misty eyes. With the action he brushed away doubt and fears. He was a soldier again, one to whom hearing and obedience were identical. "Chumru," he said, when he found his domestic scratching mud off a coat with his nails for lack of a clothes-brush, "we set out for Delhi to-night, you and I." "All right, sahib," was the unexpected parry to this astounding thrust, and Chumru kept on with his task. "It is a true thing," said Malcolm, who knew full well that the Mohammedan understood the extraordinary difficulty of such a mission. "It is the General-sahib's order, and he wishes you to go with me. Will you come?"