to the fort that he, Atherly, was one of those government chappies, and so awfully keen on Indian politics.  “Friddy” had been the first to find it out, but they thought she was chaffing.  At which “Friddy,” who had suddenly resolved herself into the youthfulest of schoolgirls in the presence of her brother, put her parasol like an Indian club behind her back, and still rosy, beamed admiringly upon Reggy.  Then the three, Peter leading his horse, moved on towards the fort, presently meeting “Georgy,” the six-foot Guardsman cousin in extraordinary tweeds and flannel shirt; Lord Runnybroke, uncle of Friddy, middle-aged and flannel-shirted, a mighty hunter; Lady Runnybroke, in a brown duster, but with a stately head that suggested ostrich feathers; Moyler-Spence, M. P., with an eyeglass, and the Hon. Evelyn Kayne, closely attended by the always gallant Lieutenant Forsyth.  Peter began to feel a nervous longing to be alone on the burning plain and the empty horizon beyond them, until he could readjust himself to these new conditions, and glanced half-wearily around him.  But his eye met Friddy’s, who seemed to have evoked this gathering with a wave of her parasol, like the fairy of a pantomime, and he walked on in silence.

A day or two of unexpected pleasure passed for Peter.  In these new surroundings he found he could separate Lady Elfrida from his miserable past, and the conventional restraint of Ashley Grange.  Again, the revelation of her familiar name Friddy seemed to make her more accessible and human to him than her formal title, and suited the girlish simplicity that lay at the foundation of her character, of which he had seen so little before.  At least so he fancied, and so excused himself; it was delightful to find her referring to him as an older friend; pleasant, indeed, to see that her family tacitly recognized it, and frequently appealed to him with the introduction, “Friddy says you can tell us,” or “You and Friddy had better arrange it between you.”  Even the dreaded introduction of his sister was an agreeable surprise, owing to Lady Elfrida’s frank and sympathetic prepossession, which Jenny could not resist.  In a few moments they were walking together in serious and apparently confidential conversation.  For to Peter’s wonder it was the “Lady Elfrida” side of the English girl’s nature that seemed to have attracted Jenny, and not the playfulness of “Friddy,” and he was delighted to see that the young girl had assumed a grave chaperonship of the tall Mrs. Lascelles that would have done credit to Mrs. Carter or Lady Runnybroke.  Had he been less serious he might have been amused, too, at the importance of his own position in the military outpost, through the arrival of the strangers.  That this grave political enthusiast and civilian should be on familiar terms with a young Englishwoman of rank was at first inconceivable to the officers.  And that he had never alluded to it before seemed to them still more remarkable.