Having ascertained from the adjutant general, that my destination was Cherat, a small camping ground, as I heard, on top of a range of mountains forming the southern limit of the valley of the Peshawar, and having received railroad warrants, via Allahabad, for the temporary station of Jhelum, and dak warrants from that spot to Cherat itself, I made my preparations for the long journey which still lay before me; amongst the necessaries for mind and body I purchased were some French novels which included that masterpiece of drawing-room erotic literature Mademoiselle de Maupin by Thйophile Grautier.
The route from Bombay via Allahabad to Peshawar runs almost entirely through a country as flat as a table. Only once on this journey, about which I fear I may become tedious, did the tempter accost me, and then so clumsily as quite to frustrate his well-meant intentions. I had to make a few hours' stay in Allahabad and to pass that away pleasantly I wandered about, examining the tombs of the kings and princes who reigned in past times over the banks of the Ganges and the Jumna, and in seeing such sights as I could find to amuse and interest me. As I was returning to my hotel a native accosted me in very good English.
'Like to have woman, sahib? I got one very pretty little half-caste in my house, if master like to come and see!'
Oh! dear Mademoiselle de Maupin!
I felt no desire to see the pretty little half-caste! I put this self-abnegation down to virtue, and actually laughed, in my folly, at the idea that there existed, or could exist, a woman in India who could raise even a ghost of desire in me!