"I have the Devil's own luck!" he murmured. "While they were burying I
missed you from among the officers; and then it struck me that you
might have got away before the disaster. We counted the men, and found
thirty-four short, so we came on here. By God! what a chap Mistley was!
We came here without a check. His maps are perfect!"

"Yes," admitted Agar, "that man knew his business!"

There was something in his tone that might have been envy or perhaps mere
admiration; for this man knew himself to be inferior in many ways to him
who had first crossed the mountain pass on which he stood.

"The worst of it is," went on the great officer, "that you are
telegraphed home as killed."

He paused on the last word, watching its effect. It would seem that,
behind the busy black eyes, there was the beginning of a thought hatched
within the grey close-cut head which, _en fait de tetes,_ was without its
rival in the Empire.

"That is soon remedied," opined the Major with a cheerful laugh.

"Ye--es!"

The great man was thoughtfully rubbing his chin with the tips of the
first and second fingers, drawing in his under lip at the same time, and
apparently taking pleasure in the rasping sound caused by the friction
over the shaven chin.

There is usually something written in the human countenance--some single