He took her hand and pressed it again and again in his old, unconscious
way. Then he let it go, and went slowly to the door. There he turned
and looked back at her. He mastered the hot thought in him. "God help
me!" she murmured from the cot. The next morning Richard went back to
Greyhope.




CHAPTER VII

A COURT-MARTIAL

It was hard to tell, save for a certain deliberateness of speech and a
colour a little more pronounced than that of a Spanish woman, that Mrs.
Frank Armour had not been brought up in England. She had a kind of grave
sweetness and distant charm which made her notable at any table or in
any ballroom. Indeed, it soon became apparent that she was to be the
pleasant talk, the interest of the season. This was tolerably comforting
to the Armours. Again Richard's prophecy had been fulfilled, and as he
sat alone at Greyhope and read the Morning Post, noticing Lali's name
at distinguished gatherings, or, picking up the World, saw how the lion-
hunters talked extravagantly of her, he took some satisfaction to himself
that he had foreseen her triumph where others looked for her downfall.
Lali herself was not elated; it gratified her, but she had been an angel,
and a very unsatisfactory one, if it had not done so. As her confidence
grew (though outwardly she had never appeared to lack it greatly), she
did not hesitate to speak of herself as an Indian, her country as a good
country, and her people as a noble if dispossessed race; all the more so