"He is fourteenth earl."

"Then he and your mother are first cousins?"

"Quite so; and I am his first cousin once removed."

"Ah! that is very nice for you," said old Hyde, with a tinge of
contempt in his tone. "They're not much use to you though, these fine
relations. Surely Lord Essendine could have got you a commission by
holding up his hand?"

"That's just what he would not do, and why I hate him and the whole of
the Wilders family. Lord Essendine has never recognised us."

"Why? Is there any reason?"

"The Honourable Anastasius made a poor match, married against his
father's wish, and was cut off with a shilling. His brother, the next
earl, was disposed to make it up, but my grandfather died, and my
grandmother married again--an honest sea-captain--and the noble peer
cut her dead."

"And so you joined the Royal Picts. But I wonder you came to this
regiment to serve with your cousin."

"I enlisted, you know, a couple of years before he was gazetted to the
corps."

"Do they know you took the shilling?--that you are now a