DOUBLES AND AND QUITS. CHAPTER X. · BURRIDGE'S STORY CONTINUED. "And all Her falser self slipped from her like a robe." -TENNYSON. "From all such devils, good Lord, deliver us." -Taming of the Shrew. "I NEEDN'T bore you with the march up. At Benares they took us and sent us off with a 'flying column,' and we were dodging about after rebels for nine weeks; then we got to Allahabad, and off again on another cruise, and so on we were handed about from one place to another, and all through Central India. The detachment was separated and VOL. II. A broken up by this time, for they boned men and officers just as they wanted them, and didn't care what regiment you belonged to, and whether you were cavalry, infantry, or artillery-but you know all that. I had very affectionate letters from Carlotta every now and then; to read them you would have believed that she spent half her time in praying for me, and the other half in bullying the post office authorities about not getting my letters regularly. "It was a horrid campaign-nothing but marches and forced marches-pelting away after the mutineers in the heat of the sun, just as if we were in Northern Europenight-alarms and day-alarms-short commons and long fasts-fever, ague, cholera, and sunstroke, that was about the programme. Deuced little fighting. Now and then we got a chance, and blazed at them at long range; and sometimes, when they were two hundred to one, they would stand up to their guns-then there was a rush and a little bayoneting; but it was all over in a minute or two, and they were off like the wind, and it had all to begin again-padnaggering away after the beggars, and all for no satisfaction. I was sick of it, and uncommon glad when we were ordered into quarters. Then I joined my new regiment. They were at Wallahbad, a small station near the hills. I had never seen them all this time, for they had been cruising in another direction. I liked them—they were a good set of fellows; and when I joined I found I had just got my troop. Promotion was going fast then (the sun had something to say to that, and cholera a good deal); but as I was an infantry fellow, I had the drill and riding-school business to go through, and that was a bore. Somehow I couldn't make up my mind to tell the fellows I was married, and I was so young no one would have dreamt of it. I was desperately unwilling that Carlotta should come up, and always wanted her to put off and off. I told her I was kept so busy with the drill and riding-school it was no good her coming up yet a while, and that she had better stay where she was. So she did for a bit; but I suppose she got sick of it, for all of a sudden up she came without any warning. That put me in a nice fix, I can tell you. I remember her arrival so well. It was just after tiffin, and all the fellows were lounging about in the mess - compound, for it was coolish weather. The public road ran just past the compound; and all of a sudden some one sang out, 'Holloa! an arrival!what's this?' and we looked, and there was a string of dâk gharries-four or five of them-covered with baggage and servants and things. This was a great excitement, and we all ran and looked over the wall; and the first gharrie-who do you think was in it? who but Kitty Coloony, my |