“Why, Hyde! what extraordinary language is this?  What do you know of Mrs. Wilders?  What can you mean?”

“Some day you shall hear everything, but not now.  It is too long a story.  Besides, here we are at Balaclava.  Do you know where your uncle’s ship lies?”

CHAPTER XX.

RED TAPE.

“What! back again so soon, Stanny,” was Captain Faulks’s greeting as McKay stepped on board the Burlington Castle.  “I am right glad to see you.  Is that a friend of yours?” pointing to Hyde.  “He is welcome too.  What brings you to Balaclava?”

McKay explained in a few words the errand on which they had come.

“Drift-wood—­is that what you’re after?  All right, my hearties, I can help you to what you want.  My crew is standing idle, and I will send the second officer out with them in the boats.  They can land it for you, and load up your horses.”

Before the afternoon Hyde started for the camp with a plentiful supply of fuel, intending to return next morning to take up any other supplies that could be secured.  McKay tackled his uncle on this subject that same evening.

“Blankets?  Yes, my boy, you shall have all we can spare, and I daresay we can fit you out with a few dozen jerseys, and perhaps some seamen’s boots.”

“We want all the warm clothing we can get,” said McKay.  “The men are being frozen to death.”

“I tell you what:  there were five cases of sheepskin-jackets I brought up—­greggos, I think they call them—­what those Tartar chaps wear in Bulgaria.’”

“The very thing!  Let’s have them, uncle.”

“I wish you could, lad; but they are landed and gone into the store.”

“The commissariat store?  I’ll go after them in the morning.”

“It’ll trouble you to get them.  He is a hard nut, that commissariat officer, as you’ll see.”

Mr. Dawber, the gentleman in question, was a middle-aged officer of long standing, who had been brought up in the strictest notions of professional routine.  He had regulations on the brain.  He was a slave to red tape, and was prepared to die rather than diverge from the narrow grooves in which he had been trained.

The store over which he presided was in a state of indescribable chaos.  It could not be arranged as he had seen stores all his life, so he did nothing to it at all.

When McKay arrived early next day, Mr. Dawber was being interviewed by a doctor from a hospital-ship.  The discussion had already grown rather serious.

“I tell you my patients are dying of cold,” said the doctor.  “I must have the stoves.”

“It is quite impossible,” replied Mr. Dawber, “without a requisition properly signed.”

“By whom?”

“It’s not my place, sir, to teach you the regulations, but if you refer to page 347, paragraph 6, you will find that no demands can be complied with unless they have been through the commanding officer of the troops, the senior surgeon, the principal medical officer, the senior commissariat officer, the brigadier, and the general of division.  Bring me a requisition duly completed, and you shall have the stoves.”