“But you weren’t, you see, so it’s all right. I had an inspiration that you’d be in your own house for Christmas. What time is dinner? Lend me a warm tea-gown, Georgie. How cold it gets here when the sun sets, and yet we were nearly roasted this morning! My belongings were to follow in a bullock-cart or two, but I haven’t heard them arrive. Oh, it is sweet to see you two again, and looking so thoroughly happy and fit, too.” She bestowed a kiss on the top of Dick’s head, remarking as she did so that he was getting disgracefully bald, and rushed away to lavish a series of hugs on Georgia in the privacy of her own room. Her toilet did not take long when she was left alone, and she threw over her head the white shawl Georgia had left with her, and stepped out on the verandah. There was only a faint gleam of moonlight, and a sense of the vastness and dreariness of the desert around crept over her as she tried to distinguish in the blackness the lights of the Alibad cantonments, through which she had passed in the afternoon. The wind was chill, and gathering her wrap more closely round her, she turned to find her way back to the drawing-room. As she did so, the sound of a horse’s footsteps struck upon her ear. Some one was riding past the house at no great distance, riding at a smart pace, which caused a clatter of accoutrements and an occasional sharp metallic ring when the horse’s hoofs came in contact with a rock. “How horrid it must be riding in the dark!” said Mabel to herself. “Dick,” she cried, meeting her brother in the hall, “are you expecting any one to dinner? Some one is coming here on horseback.” “Oh no, it’s no one for us,” he answered shortly. “But where can he be going, then? I thought this was the last English house on the frontier? It’s a soldier, I’m sure, for I heard his sword knocking against the stirrup, or whatever it is that makes the clinkety-clanking noise.” “I can’t tell you who it is, for I don’t know, but the natives will tell you, if you are particularly anxious to hear. They say it’s General Keeling.” “Georgia’s father? But he’s dead!” “Exactly.” “But do you mean that it’s his ghost?” “Don’t talk so loud. I don’t want Georgia worried just now, and she may not have noticed the sound. The natives say that whenever there is going to be trouble on the frontier St George Keeling gallops from point to point to see that things are all right, just as he would have done in his lifetime.” “Oh, but they don’t believe it really?” “You shall see. Ismail Bakhsh!” The old _chaprasi_ who had met Mabel at the door came forward, gorgeous in his scarlet coat and gold badge, and saluted. “Tell the Miss Sahib who it is she hears, out beyond the far corner of the compound.” The old man drew himself up and saluted again. “Sinjāj Kīlin Sahib Bahadar rides to-night, Miss Sahib.” “Oh, how dreadful!” said Mabel, turning to her brother with a blanched face. Ismail Bakhsh understood her words.