e iron bar,
and the lady sat in the tonga behind Ram Singh. Her runners, in uniform,
waited beside the empty rickshaw with a puzzled look, at which she
laughed, and threw a rupee to the head man.

The luggage was piled and corded on three ekkas behind, and their
cross-legged drivers, too, were ready.

'Chellao!' she cried, crisply, and Ram Singh imperturbably lifted the
reins. The little procession clanked and jingled along the hillside,
always tending down, and broke upon the early grey melancholy with a
forced and futile cheerfulness, too early, like everything else. As
it passed the last of Simla's little gardens, spread like a
pocket-handkerchief on the side of the hill, the lady leaned forward and
looked back as if she wished to impress the place upon her memory. Her
expression was that of a person going forth without demur into the
day's hazards, ready to cope with them, yet there was some regret in the
backward look.

'It's a place,' she said aloud, 'where EVERYBODY has a good time!'

Then the Amusement Club went out of sight behind a curve; and she
settled herself more comfortably among her cushions, and drew a wrap
round her to meet the chill wind of the valley. It was all behind
her. The lady looked out as the ponies galloped up to the first
changing-place, and, seeing a saddled horse held by a syce, cramped
herself a little into one corner to make room. The seat would just hold
two.

Ram Singh salaamed, getting down to harness the fresh pair, and a man
put his face in at the side of the tonga and took off his hat.

'Are you all right?' he said. His smile was as conscious as his words
were casual.

'Quite right. The ayah was silly about coming--didn't want to leave her
babies or something--so I had to leave her behind. Everything else is
either here or in the ekkas.'

'The brute! Never mind--they're not much use in a railway journey. You
can pick up another at Bombay. Then I suppose I'd better get in.'

'I suppose you better had. Unless you think of walking,' she laughed,
and he took the place beside her.

Ram Singh again unquestioningly took up the reins.

'Nobody else going down?'

'Not another soul. We might just as well have started together.'

'Oh, well, we couldn't tell. Beastly awkward if there had been anybody.'

'Yes,' she said, but thrust up her under lip indifferently.

Then, with the effect of turning to the business in hand, she bent her
eyes upon him understandingly and smiled