the fellow’s sister.  She talked till she piped her eye—­talked about our lasting union.  On my soul, I believe I egged Netty on!  I was in a mollified way with that wine; all of a sudden the woman joins their hands!  And I—­a man of spirit will despise me!—­what I thought of was, ‘now my secret’s safe!’ You’ve sobered me, young sir.  I see myself, if that’s being sober.  I don’t ask your opinion of me; I am a deserter, false to my colours, a breaker of his oath.  Only mark this:  I was married, and a common trooper, married to a handsome young woman, true as steel; but she was handsome, and we were starvation poor, and she had to endure persecution from an officer day by day.  Bear that situation in your mind. . . .  Providence dropped me a hundred pounds out of the sky.  Properly speaking, it popped up out of the earth, for I reaped it, you may say, from a relative’s grave.  Rich and poor ’s all right, if I’m rich and you’re poor; and you may be happy though you’re poor; but where there are many poor young women, lots of rich men are a terrible temptation to them.  That’s my dear good wife speaking, and had she been spared to me I never should have come back to Old England, and heart’s delight and heartache I should not have known.  She was my backbone, she was my breast-comforter too.  Why did she stick to me?  Because I had faith in her when appearances were against her.  But she never forgave this country the hurt to her woman’s pride.  You’ll have noticed a squarish jaw in Netty.  That’s her mother.  And I shall have to encounter it, supposing I find Mart Tinman has been playing me false.  I’m blown on somehow.  I’ll think of what course I’ll take ’twixt now and morning.  Good night, young gentleman.”

“Good night; sir,” said Herbert, adding, “I will get information from the Horse Guards; as for the people knowing it about here, you’re not living much in society—­”

“It’s not other people’s feelings, it’s my own,” Van Diemen silenced him.  “I feel it, if it’s in the wind; ever since Mart Tinman spoke the thing out, I’ve felt on my skin cold and hot.”

He flourished his lighted candle and went to bed, manifestly solaced by the idea that he was the victim of his own feelings.

Herbert could not sleep.  Annette’s monstrous choice of Tinman in preference to himself constantly assailed and shook his understanding.  There was the “squarish jaw” mentioned by her father to think of.  It filled him with a vague apprehension, but he was unable to imagine that a young girl, and an English girl, and an enthusiastic young English girl, could be devoid of sentiment; and presuming her to have it, as one must, there was no fear, that she would persist in her loathsome choice when she knew her father was against it.

CHAPTER IX

Annette did not shun him next morning.  She did not shun the subject, either.  But she had been exact in arranging that she should not be more than a few minutes downstairs before her father.  Herbert found, that compared with her, girls of sentiment are commonplace indeed.  She had conceived an insane idea of nobility in Tinman that blinded her to his face, figure, and character—­his manners, likewise.  He had forgiven a blow!