Now Malcolm had already visited Sir Henry Lawrence and told him the exact circumstances. The Chief Commissioner exonerated him from any blame and, as a temporary matter, appointed him an extra A.D.C. on his staff. But the sore rankled and it was destined in due time to affect the young officer's fortunes in the most unexpected way. Above all else he did not want Winifred to know that solicitude in her behalf had drawn him from the path of duty. So he fenced with her sympathetic inquiries, and she, womanlike, began to search for some shortcoming on her own part to account for her lover's gloom. Thus, not a rift, but an absence of full and complete understanding, existed between them, and each was conscious of it, though Malcolm alone knew its cause. But that little cloud only darkened their own small world. Around them was the clash of arms and the din of preparation for the "fortnight's siege" which Lawrence thought the Residency might withstand if held resolutely! In truth, there never was a fortification, with the exception of that four-foot mud wall at Cawnpore, less calculated to repel the assault of a determined foe than the ill-planned defenses which provided the last English refuge in Oudh. Winifred soon proved that she was of good metal. The alarms and excursions of the past three weeks were naturally trying to a girl born and bred in a quiet Devon village. But heredity, mostly blamed for the transmission of bad qualities, supplies good ones, too, whether in man or maid. Descended on her father's side from a race of soldiers and diplomats, her mother was a Yorkshire Trenholme, and it is said on Hambledon Moor that there were Trenholmes in Yorkshire before there was a king in England. In spite of the terrific heat and the discomfort of her new surroundings she made light of difficulties, found solace herself by cheering others, and quickly attained a prominent place in that small band of devoted women whose names will live until the story of Lucknow is forgotten. She met Frank only occasionally and by chance, their days being full of work and striving. A smile, a few tender words, perhaps nothing more than a hurried wave of the hand in passing, constituted their love idyll, for Lawrence fell ill and his aides were kept busy, day and night, in passing to and fro between the bedside of the stricken leader and the many posts where his counsel was sought or the hasty provision of defense lagged for his orders. The Chief was so worn out with anxiety and sleepless labor that on June 9 he delegated his authority to a provisional council. Then the impetuous and chivalric Martin Gubbins, Financial Commissioner of Oudh, saw a means of attaining by compromise that which he had vainly urged on Lawrence--he persuaded the commanding officers of the native regiments in Lucknow to tell their men to go home on furlough until November.