unt and offer to help her. Her big sunhat hid her
face, and at that distance Wargrave could only see that she was small
and slight, as she walked up the garden path.

When the signallers' afternoon practice was over the subaltern passed
across the parade ground to the Political Officer's house. When he
entered the pretty drawing-room, bright with the gay colours of chintz
curtains and cushions, he found the strangers present, one man talking
to Mrs. Dermot at her tea-table, the other chatting with the Colonel,
while Burke was installed beside a girl seated in a low cane chair and
dressed in a smart, hand-embroidered Tussore silk dress, _suede_ shoes
and silk stockings. Little Brian stood beside her with one arm
affectionately round her neck, while Eileen was perched in her lap. But
when Frank appeared the mite wriggled down to the floor and rushed to
him.

The subaltern was presented to Miss Benson, her father and Carter, the
Sub-Divisional Officer or Civil Service official of the district. When
he sat down Eileen clambered on to his knee and seriously interfered
with his peaceful enjoyment of his tea; but while he talked to her he
was watching Miss Benson over the small golden head. She was
astonishingly pretty, with silky black hair curving in natural waves,
dark-bordered Irish grey eyes fringed with long, thick lashes, a
rose-tinted complexion, a pouting, red-lipped mouth and a small nose
with the most fascinating, provoking suspicion of a tip-tilt. She was as
small and daintily-fashioned as her hostess; and Wargrave thought it
marvellous that their forgotten outpost on the face of the mountains
should hold two such pretty women at the same time. His comrade Burke
was evidently acutely conscious of Muriel Benson's attractions, and, his
pleasantly ugly face aglow with a happy smile, he was flirting as openly
and outrageously with her as she with him.

"Sure, it's a cure for sore eyes ye are, Miss Flower Face," he said.
"That's the name I christened her with the first moment I saw her,
Wargrave. Doesn't it fit her?" Then turning to the girl again, he
continued, "Aren't you ashamed av yourself for laving me to pine for a
sight av ye all these weary months?"

Miss Benson could claim to be Irish on her mother's side and so was a
ready-witted match for the doctor's Celtic exuberance; though to
Wargrave watching it seemed that Burke's easy banter cloaked a deeper
feeling.

Drawn into their conversation Frank found the