We'll go down the
Mall." A woman is made differently, especially if she be such a woman as the
Man's Wife. She and the Tertium Quid enjoyed each other's society among the
graves of men and women whom they had known and danced with aforetime.
They used to take a big horse-blanket and sit on the grass a little to the
left of the lower end, where there is a dip in the ground and where the
occupied graves stop short and the ready-made ones are not ready. Each well-
regulated India Cemetery keeps half a dozen graves permanently open for
contingencies and incidental wear and tear. In the Hills these are more
usually baby's size, because children who come up weakened and sick from the
Plains often succumb to the effects of the Rains in the Hills or get pneumonia
from their ayahs taking them through damp pine-woods after the sun has set. In
Cantonments, of course, the man's size is more in request; these arrangements
varying with the climate and population.
One day when the Man's Wife and the Tertium Quid had just arrived in the
Cemetery, they saw some coolies breaking ground. They had marked out a full-
size grave, and the Tertium Quid asked them whether any Sahib was sick. They
said that they did not know; but it was an order that they should dig a
Sahib's grave.
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