; let us gaze on the outside, even if we are denied
to see the inside. I wonder if your father will come tonight?"

"No; getting too late," said Sam. "Evidently Halbert and the Doctor
have found themselves there during their ride, and are keeping him and
Mrs. Hawker company. They will all three be over to-morrow morning,
depend on it."

"What a really good fellow that Halbert is," said Captain Brentwood.
"One of the best companions I ever met. I wish his spirits would
improve with his health. A sensitive fellow like him is apt not to
recover from a blow like his."

"What blow?" said Mrs. Buckley.

"Did you never hear?" said the Captain. "The girl he was going to be
married to got drowned coming out to him in the Assam."

Chapter XLV

IN WHICH THERE ARE SOME ASTONISHING REVELATIONS WITH REGARD TO DR.
MULHAUS AND CAPTAIN DESBOROUGH.

At ten o'clock the next morning arrived the Major, the Doctor, and
Halbert; and the first notice they had of it was the Doctor's voice in
the passage, evidently in a great state of excitement.

"No more the common bower-bird than you, sir; a new species. His eyes
are red instead of blue, and the whole plumage is lighter. I will call
it after you, my dear Major."

"You have got to shoot him first," said the Major.

"I'll soon do that," said the Doctor, bursting into the room-door. "How
do you do, all of you? Sam, glad to see you back again. Brentwood, you
are welcome to your own house. Get me your gun--where is it?"

"In my bedroom," said the Captain.

The Doctor went off after it. He reappeared again to complain that the
caps would not fit; but, being satisfied on that score, he disappeared
down the garden, on murderous thoughts intent.

Sam got his father away into the verandah, and told him all his plans.
I need hardly say that they met with the Major's entire approval. All
his plans I said; no, not all. Sam never hinted at the end and object
of all his endeavours; he never said a word about his repurchase of
Clere. The Major had no more idea that Sam had ever thought of such a
thing, or had been making inquiries, than had the owner of Clere
himself.

"Sam, my dear boy," said he, "I am very sorry to lose you, and we shall
have but a dull time of it henceforth; but I am sure it is good for a
man to go out into the world by himself" (and all that sort of thing).
"When you are gone, Brentwood and I mean to live together, to console
one another."

"My dear, are you c