and get a small wound pension. And I've a project which will
make lots of money--up in Rhodesia--a tip I've had from a
man in the know. I'm going to take up some land near
Salisbury. Ripping country and climate and all that. It
would suit you down to the ground. You could put all that
Warren business behind you, forget it all, drop the name,
start a new career as Mrs. Frank Gardner, and find an
eternally devoted husband in the man that signs this letter.

I've been out here long enough to be up to all the ropes,
and I'd already made a bit of money in Rhodesia before the
war broke out and I got a commission. At any rate I've
enough to start on as a married man, enough to give you a
decent outfit and your passage out here and have a honeymoon
before we start work on our future home. Darling Vivie! Do
think about it. You'd never regret it. I'm a very different
Frank to the silly ass you knew in the old Haslemere days.
Now here's a five pound note to cover the cost of a full
cable to say "yes," and when you'll be ready to start. When
I get your answer--somehow I feel it'll _be_ "yes"--I'll
send you a draft on a London bank to pay for a suitable
trousseau and your passage from London to Cape Town, and _of
course_ I'll come and meet you there, where we can be
married. I shan't sleep properly till I get your "yes."

Your ever loving and always faithful
FRANK.

P.S. There's a poor fellow here in the same ward dying--I
should say--of necrosis of the jaw--Vavasour Williams is his
name or a part of his name. His father was at Cambridge with
my old man, and--isn't it rum?--he was a pupil of
_Praddy's_!! He mucked his school and 'varsity career,
thought next he'd like to be an architect or a scene
painter. My dad recommended Praddy as a master. He worked in
the Praed studio, but got the chuck over some foolery. Then
as he couldn't face his poor old Governor, he enlisted in
the Bechuanaland Border police, came out to South Africa and
got let in for this show. The doctors and nurses give him
about a month and he doesn't know it. He can't talk much
owing to his jaw being tied up--usually he writes me
messages, all about going home and being a good boy, turning
over a new lea