lated. "He must have good interest, though.
He must have got the Colonel the place."

"He!" said Brown, with a sneer. "Pooh. It was Lord Steyne got it.

"How do you mean?"

"A virtuous woman is a crown to her husband," answered the other
enigmatically, and went to read his papers.

Rawdon, for his part, read in the Royalist the following astonishing
paragraph:

GOVERNORSHIP OF COVENTRY ISLAND.--H.M.S. Yellowjack, Commander
Jaunders, has brought letters and papers from Coventry Island. H. E.
Sir Thomas Liverseege had fallen a victim to the prevailing fever at
Swampton. His loss is deeply felt in the flourishing colony. We hear
that the Governorship has been offered to Colonel Rawdon Crawley, C.B.,
a distinguished Waterloo officer. We need not only men of acknowledged
bravery, but men of administrative talents to superintend the affairs
of our colonies, and we have no doubt that the gentleman selected by
the Colonial Office to fill the lamented vacancy which has occurred at
Coventry Island is admirably calculated for the post which he is about
to occupy.

"Coventry Island! Where was it? Who had appointed him to the
government? You must take me out as your secretary, old boy," Captain
Macmurdo said laughing; and as Crawley and his friend sat wondering and
perplexed over the announcement, the Club waiter brought in to the
Colonel a card on which the name of Mr. Wenham was engraved, who begged
to see Colonel Crawley.

The Colonel and his aide-de-camp went out to meet the gentleman,
rightly conjecturing that he was an emissary of Lord Steyne. "How d'ye
do, Crawley? I am glad to see you," said Mr. Wenham with a bland smile,
and grasping Crawley's hand with great cordiality.

"You come, I suppose, from--"

"Exactly," said Mr. Wenham.

"Then this is my friend Captain Macmurdo, of the Life Guards Green."

"Delighted to know Captain Macmurdo, I'm sure," Mr. Wenham said and
tendered another smile and shake of the hand to the second, as he had
done to the principal. Mac put out one finger, armed with a buckskin
glove, and made a very frigid bow to Mr. Wenham over his tight cravat.
He was, perhaps, discontented at being put in communication with a
pekin, and thought that Lord Steyne should have sent him a Colonel at
the very least.

"As Macmurdo acts for me, and knows what I mean," Crawley said, "I had
better retire and leave you together."

"Of course," said Macmurdo.

"By no means, my dear Colonel," Mr