engage with him to bear this common
disappointment as gentlemen, as Christians! No man living has more
cause to be grateful for the blessing of a good wife than I, but I
trust I should have been granted sufficient resolution to live solitary
for ever had I perceived that my happiness was likely to mean a
brother's misery, and imperil the hopes of a nation. You are not
called even to make such a renunciation, since the matter is taken out
of your hands--merely to acquiesce in a decision not your own."

"But if I am to blame, sir, so must Charteris be," protested Gerrard,
feeling, as the Resident's associates not infrequently did, that
Colonel Antony's standard was too high for this wicked world.

"That is quite possible. He believes that you have injured him?"

"I suppose so, sir."

"And he is conscious that he has injured you?"

"I can't say, sir. How should I know?"

"Then your duty is clear. Whether his conscience is awakened or not is
uncertain, but you feel that you have, though unwittingly, done him an
injury. Go and repair it, leaving him to find out his part in the
matter for himself."

It was this conversation that Gerrard was uncomfortably turning over in
his mind on the verandah. The natural man in him rebelled, very
naturally, against humbling himself to Charteris, who was at least as
much to blame as he was, and had made his resentment offensively
evident. But it was Charteris who would suffer if a reconciliation was
not effected in some way. The argument was conclusive, as Colonel
Antony had foreseen it would be. Gerrard looked round the corner of
his chair, and rather sheepishly said, "Bob!"

There was no answer from Charteris, but his legs, the only part of him
that was visible, seemed to take on an air of indignant protest.
Gerrard tried again. "Bob, look here! I want to tell you something."

This time Charteris sat up, exhibiting an angry countenance and a rough
head. "Don't want to hear it," he growled. "Hang it! can't a man be
left in peace in his own quarters?"

"No, but--I say, Bob," repeated Gerrard, feverishly anxious to
anticipate the impending move, "the Colonel has been speaking to
me--pitched it uncommon strong, he did. Do wait and hear what I have
to say! Why should we go on making asses of ourselves over a girl who
hasn't a civil word for either of us?"

"What?" cried Charteris, pausing on the edge of the verandah. "She's
given you a _pucka jawab_[1] too?"

"L