have been about
fifteen then, reflecting at Winchester with the other 'men' upon the
comparative merits of tinned sardines and jam roll, and whether a packet
of real Egyptians was not worth the sacrifice of either. His father was
colonel of the Twelfth; his mother was still charming. It was the year
before Dick Forsyth came down from the neighbourhood of Sheikhbudin with
a brevet and a good deal of personal damage. I mention him because he
proved Anna's charm in the only conclusive way before the eyes of us
all; and the station, I remember, was edified to observe that if Mrs.
Chichele came out of the matter 'straight'--one relapses so easily into
the simple definitions of those parts--which she undoubtedly did, she
owed it in no small degree to Judy Harbottle. This one feels to be
hardly a legitimate reference, but it is something tangible to lay hold
upon in trying to describe the web of volitions which began to weave
itself between the two that afternoon on my veranda and which afterward
became so strong a bond. I was delighted with the thing; its simplicity
and sincerity stood out among our conventional little compromises at
friendship like an ideal. She and Judy had the assurance of one another;
they made upon one another the finest and often the most unconscionable
demands. One met them walking at odd hours in queer places, of which I
imagine they were not much aware. They would turn deliberately off the
Maidan and away from the bandstand to be rid of our irrelevant bows;
they did their duty by the rest of us, but the most egregious among us,
the Deputy-Commissioner for selection, could see that he hardly counted.
I thought I understood, but that may have been my fatuity; certainly
when their husbands inquired what on earth they had been talking of, it
usually transpired that they had found an infinite amount to say about
nothing. It was a little worrying to hear Colonel Chichele and Major
Harbottle describe their wives as 'pals,' but the fact could not be
denied, and after all we were in the Punjab. They were pals too, but the
terms were different.

People discussed it according to their lights, and girls said in pretty
wonderment that Mrs. Harbottle and Mrs. Chichele were like men, they
never kissed each other. I think Judy prescribed these conditions. Anna
was far more a person who did as the world told her. But it was a poor
negation to describe all that they never did; there was no common little
convention of