my wife also. You'd be the last to deny
that.--Jove, it's amazing what a fine crop of complications will grow
out of one false step. A little want of frankness on her part; a
little over-hastiness on mine; . . and see where we've travelled in
consequence. All my work in the past five years has been tending
towards something of this kind. But it would never do . . for Quita.
Think what a life for a woman, even if one could hope to have her there
in time. Shut up in the heart of the hills, with half a dozen
Englishmen, and a husband who might end in going to the devil. Not
another woman nearer than Srinagar; and communication with India cut
off for six months in the year. No. One would never get permission.
It would simply wrench us apart again.--There seems to be a Fate
against this marriage of mine every way. My fault, no doubt. Perhaps
as a soldier with a taste for exploration, I was a fool to go in for it
at all."

Desmond leaned forward, and flicked the ash from his cigar.

"Nonsense, man," he said emphatically. "You're talking heresy and
schism! Soldier or no soldier, I believe in marriage. Always have
done. With all its difficulties, it's an incomparable bond; as you'll
find out, once you two are on the right footing. But you're hardly fit
enough yet to see things in their true perspective. All this Gilgit
business is still a good way ahead; and I can only say that if it does
come to spending a good part of your service up in the wilds, you could
not have chosen a woman more fitted for it than Quita. The better one
knows her, the more one admires her . ."

The other's face softened.

"She's as straight and as plucky as a man," he said simply. "And
whenever comes of it, I'm a lucky devil to be her husband.--Think I'll
turn in now, and try for a little sleep. I never meant to inflict my
affairs on you like this. But you bring it on yourself, Desmond, by
being so confoundedly sympathetic!"

Before the two men parted, the box of opium pills had changed hands:
and Lenox, by way of trying for a little sleep, lit a fresh cigar,--he
was beginning to tolerate them now,--and went out into the garden.

Its open spaces were saturated with moonlight; while trees and bushes,
solitary or huddled together, stood in black pools of shadow, and
fragments of curded cloud trailed across the sky. Absorbed in thought,
Lenox crossed a stretch of lawn set with rose-beds; and turning at the
far end strolled back