of the Queen's
Greys, a friend of Colonel de Warrenne, an ex-admirer of his late
wife, and a great pal of his son.)

"'Tithn't a waper. It'th my thword. I made it mythelf."

"Who helped?"

"Nobody. At leatht, Khodadad Khan, Orderly, knocked the holes in the
tin like I showed him--or elthe got the Farrier Thargeant to do it,
and thaid _he_ had."

"Yes--but who told you how to make it like this? Where did you see a
hand-part like this? It isn't like Daddy's sword, nor Khodadad Khan's
_tulwar_. Where did you copy it?"

"I didn't copy it.... I shot ten rats wiv a bow-and-arrow last night.
At leatht--I don't think I shot ten. Nor one. I don't think I didn't,
pwaps."

"But hang it all, the thing's an Italian rapier, by Gad. Some one
_must_ have shown you how to make the thing, or you've got a picture.
It's a _pukka_[5] mediaeval rapier."

"No it'th not. It'th my thword. I made it.... Have a jolly
fight"--and the boy struck an extraordinarily correct fencing
attitude--left hand raised in balance, sword poised, legs and feet
well placed, the whole pose easy, natural, graceful.

Curiously enough, the sword was held horizontal instead of pointing
upward, a fact which at once struck the observant and practised eye of
Major John Decies, sometime champion fencer.

"Who's been teaching you fencing?" he asked.

"What ith 'fenthing'? Let'th have a fight," replied the boy.

"Stick me here, Dam," invited the Major, seating himself and
indicating the position of the heart. "Bet you can't."

The boy lunged, straight, true, gracefully, straightening all his
limbs except his right leg, rigidly, strongly, and the "sword" bent
upward from the spot on which the man's finger had just rested.

"Gad! Who _has_ taught you to lunge? I shall have a bruise there, and
perhaps--live. Who's behind all this, young fella? Who taught you to
stand so, and to lunge? Ochterlonie Sahib or Daddy?"

"Nobody. What is 'lunge'? Will you buy me a little baby-camel to play
with and teach tricks? Perhaps it would sit up and beg. Do camelth lay
eggth? Chucko does. Millions and lakhs. You get a thword, too, and
we'll fight every day. Yeth. All day long----"

"Good morning, Sir," said Nurse Beaton, bustling into the verandah
from the nursery. "He's as mad as ever on swords and fighting, you
see. It's a soldier he'll be, the lamb. He's taken to making that
black orderly pull out his sword when he's in uniform. Makes him wave
and jab it about. Gives me t