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On the 19th of June he crossed the frontier of Mysore; reached Bangalore on the morning of the 20th and rested there for three days in the house of the Commandant. "On Monday, the 23rd, I took leave of Colonel Cubbon, who told me, with a warmth which I was vain enough to think sincere, that he had not passed three such pleasant days for thirty years.
Kitty unstrung her bow with a vicious jerk, and went back to her place, while Barr-Saggott was trying to pretend that he enjoyed snapping the bracelet on the snubby girl's raw, red wrist. It was an awkward scene most awkward. Every one tried to depart in a body and leave Kitty to the mercy of her Mamma. But Cubbon took her away instead, and the rest isn't worth printing.
I went on all night, sleeping soundly in my palanquin. At five I was waked, and found that a carriage was waiting for me. I had told Colonel Cubbon that I very much wished to see Seringapatam. He had written to the British authorities at the town of Mysore, and an officer had come from the Residency to show me all that was to be seen.
Now horses used to shy when Barr-Saggott smiled. Kitty saw that smile. She looked to her left-front, gave an almost imperceptible nod to Cubbon, and went on shooting. I wish I could describe the scene that followed. It was out of the ordinary and most improper. Miss Kitty fitted her arrows with immense deliberation, so that every one might see what she was doing.
On the appointed afternoon, all Simla rode down to Annandale to witness the Judgment of Paris turned upside down. Kitty rode with young Cubbon, and it was easy to see that the boy was troubled in his mind. He must be held innocent of everything that followed. Kitty was pale and nervous, and looked long at the bracelet.
So Kitty fled, now and again, from the stately wooings of Barr-Saggott to the company of young Cubbon, and was scolded by her Mamma in consequence. "But, Mother," she said, "Mr. Saggot is such such a is so FEARFULLY ugly, you know!" "My dear," said Mrs. Beighton, piously, "we cannot be other than an all-ruling Providence has made us. Besides, you will take precedence of your own Mother, you know!
The scoring had been weak, and the bracelet, PLUS Commissioner Barr-Saggott, was hers to a certainty. The Commissioner strung her bow with his own sacred hands. She stepped forward, looked at the bracelet, and her first arrow went true to a hair full into the heart of the "gold" counting nine points. Young Cubbon on the left turned white, and his Devil prompted Barr-Saggott to smile.
It was pleasant, Kitty thought, to have him at her feet, but it was better to escape from him and ride with the graceless Cubbon the man in a Dragoon Regiment at Umballa the boy with a handsome face, and no prospects. Kitty liked Cubbon more than a little. He never pretended for a moment the he was anything less than head over heels in love with her; for he was an honest boy.
They shot, and they shot, and they kept on shooting, till the sun left the valley, and little breezes got up in the deodars, and people waited for Miss Beighton to shoot and win. Cubbon was at one horn of the semicircle round the shooters, and Barr-Saggott at the other. Miss Beighton was last on the list.
I made frequent inquiries as to the cause of this, not only from natives in my own neighbourhood, but from those I met when travelling by easy stages from the Gairsoppa Falls in the north-western corner of the province to my estates in Southern Mysore, and found that the universal complaint was that there was a want of Daryápti, or active inquiry into grievances, and one of my old native neighbours was loud in his praises of the palmy days of Sir Mark Cubbon.
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