gue.

"We mustn't be piggy just because we are happy," she said to her husband
once. "How are they to know we are having our honeymoon?" And then she
nestled close to him, whispering, "It's quite the best honeymoon any
woman ever had."

To which he could make but the one reply, pressing her to his heart and
kissing the red lips that mocked so merrily when the world was looking
on.

She had become the hub of his existence, and day by day he watched her
anxiously, grasping his happiness with a feeling that it was too great
to last.

The rains set in in earnest, and the reek of the Plains rose like an
evil miasma to the turbid heavens. The atmosphere was as the interior of
a steaming cauldron. Great toadstools spread like a loathsome disease
over the compound. Fever was rife in the camp. Mosquitoes buzzed
incessantly everywhere, and rats began to take refuge in the bungalow.
Puck was privately terrified at rats, but she smothered her terror in
her husband's presence and maintained a smiling front. They laid down
poison for the rats, who died horribly in inaccessible places, making
her wonder if they were not almost preferable alive. And then one night
she discovered a small snake coiled in a corner of her bedroom.

She fled to Merryon in horror, and he and the _khitmutgar_ slew the
creature. But Puck's nerves were on edge from that day forward. She went
through agonies of cold fear whenever she was left alone, and she
feverishly encouraged the subalterns to visit her during her husband's
absence on duty.

He raised no objection till he one day returned unexpectedly to find her
dancing a hornpipe for the benefit of a small, admiring crowd to whom
she had been administering tea.

She sprang like a child to meet him at his entrance, declaring the
entertainment at an end; and the crowd soon melted away.

Then, somewhat grimly, Merryon took his wife to task.

She sat on the arm of his chair with her arms round his neck, swinging
one leg while she listened. She was very docile, punctuating his remarks
with soft kisses dropped inconsequently on the top of his head. When he
ended, she slipped cosily down upon his knee and promised to be good.

It was not a very serious promise, and it was plainly proffered in a
spirit of propitiation. Merryon pursued the matter no further, but he
was vaguely dissatisfied. He had a feeling that she regarded his
objections as the outcome of eccentric prudishness, or at the best an
unrea