"Present my compliments to the Colonel Sahib," he said. "I shall be
with him immediately."
CHAPTER IV
STAFFORD INTERVENES
The threatening cloud which had loomed up on the horizon had acted
wonders on Colonel Carmichael's constitution. At the last meeting of
the Marut Diamond Company he had looked like a man whose days on the
active service list were numbered. Ill-health, disappointment, and a
natural pessimism had apparently left an indelible trace upon him, and
Mrs. Carmichael's prophetic eye saw them both established in
Cheltenham or Bath, relegated to the Empire's lumber-room--unless
something happened. The something had happened. The one sound which
had the power to rouse him had broken like a clap of unheralded
thunder upon his ears. It was the call of danger, the war-note which
had brought back to him the springtime of his youth and strength.
Stafford found him restlessly pacing backward and forward in his
narrow workroom, deep in conversation with Nicholson, who stood at the
table, his head bent over a map of Marut. Both men were in uniform,
and it seemed to Stafford that Colonel Carmichael listened to the
click of his own spurs with the pleasure of a young lieutenant. It was
no longer the sound of weary routine. It was the herald of clashing
sabres and the champing of impatient horses awaiting the charge; it
was an echo of past warlike days which were to come again.
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