Babies, Diphtheria, Mrs. Bent and The Dancing Master, I whooping
in a chair, and The Dowd dropping in from the clouds. I wonder what the motive
was--all the motives."
"Um!"
"What do you think?"
"Don't ask me. She was a woman. Go to sleep."
* * * * * *
ONLY A SUBALTERN
... Not only to enforce by command but to encourage by example the energetic
discharge of duty and the steady endurance of the difficulties and privations
inseparable from Military Service.
--Bengal Army Regulations.
THEY made Bobby Wick pass an examination at Sandhurst. He was a gentleman
before he was gazetted, so, when the Empress announced that "Gentleman-Cadet
Robert Hanna Wick" was posted as Second Lieutenant to the Tyneside Tail
Twisters at Kram Bokhar, he became an officer and a gentleman, which is an
enviable thing; and there was joy in the house of Wick where Mamma Wick and
all the little Wicks fell upon their knees and offered incense to Bobby by
virtue of his achievements.
Papa Wick had been a Commissioner in his day, holding authority over three
millions of men in the Chota-Buldana Division, building great works for the
good of the land, and doing his best to make two blades of grass grow where
there was but one before.
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