Cocking, left in possession of the field, carefully loaded the Captain’s pistols, placed them in the saddle-holsters, and led the bay up to the house. The Captain, attired in buckskin breeches and topboots, and a coat of slightly military cut, gave him a few last instructions, and mounted the big horse. Keeping a hand on the bridle, Cocking looked up at him, and asked if he was to join him at Edenhope, when he had escorted the mistress safely home.

“No, you might not find me there. Besides, I shan’t need you.”

“Well, sir, that’s as maybe, but what I should like to know is who’s going to clean them leathers?” demanded his henchman.

“I don’t know. Mr. Babbacombe’s man, I daresay.”

“Ho!” said Cocking. “That’ll put Mr. Babbacombe’s man in prime twig, that will! Howsoever, it’s just as you wish, sir, out of course!”

He then watched his master ride off down the avenue, slowly shaking his head. A sparrow, hopping about within a few yards of him, was the recipient of his next cryptic confidence. “Resty, very resty!” he said, staring very hard at the bird. “If you was to ask me, I should say we shall have him up to some kind of bobbery in just a brace o’ snaps!”

The Captain, although he had not the smallest intention of getting up to bobbery, was heartily glad to escape from Easterby. There was nothing but Lord Melksham’s mild excesses to break the tedium; and he did not find these amusing. His cousin’s life was hedged about by all the proprieties which had driven the Captain, eight years earlier, to persuade his father to buy him a pair of colours. He had had a strong notion that the Army in time of war would suit him, and events had proved him to be right. Life in the Peninsula had been uncertain, uncomfortable, and often haphazard, but it had offered almost every kind of adventure, and John had refused none of these. He had enjoyed himself enormously, and never so intensely as when engaged upon some dangerous enterprise.