7^ he Real Charlotte, 83 



bad rowed ashore for the Dysart party, the iron had entered 

 into his soul. 



As the punt neared the launch, Mr. Hawkins looked 

 round to take his distance in bringing her alongside, and re- 

 cognised with one delighted glance the set smile of suffering 

 politeness that denoted that Captain Cursiter was making 

 himself agreeable to the ladies. Charlotte was sitting in 

 the stern with a depressing air of Sunday-outness about her, 

 and a stout umbrella over her head. It was not in her 

 nature to feel shy ; the grain of it was too coarse and strong 

 to harbour such a thing as diffidence, but she knew well 

 enough when she was socially unsuccessful, and she was al- 

 ready aware that she was going to be out of her element on 

 this expedition. Lambert, who would have been a kind of 

 connecting Unk, was already far in the offing. Captain 

 Cursiter she mentally characterised as a poor stick. 

 Hawkins, whom she had begun by liking, was daily — al- 

 most hourly — gaining in her disfavour, and from neither 

 Pamela, Francie, or Garry did she expect much entertain- 

 ment. Charlotte had a vigorous taste in conversation, and 

 her idea of a pleasure party was not to talk to Pamela 

 Dysart about the choir and the machinery of a school feast 

 for an hour and a half, and from time to time to repulse 

 with ill-assumed politeness the bird-like flights of Dinah on 

 to her lap. Francie and Mr. Hawkins sat forward on the 

 roof of the little cabin, and apparently entertained one 

 another vastly, judging by their appearance and the frag- 

 ments of conversation that from time to time made their 

 way aft in the environment of a cloud of smuts. Captain 

 Cursiter, revelHng in the well-known restrictions that en- 

 compass the man at the wheel, stood serenely aloof, steering 

 among the hump-backed green islands and treacherous 

 shallows, and thinking to himself that Hawkins was going 

 ahead pretty fast with that Dublin girl. 



Mr. Hawkins had been for some time a source of anxiety 

 to his brother officers, who disapproved of matrimony for 

 the young of their regiment. Things had looked so serious 

 when he was quartered at Limerick that he had been hur- 

 riedly sent on detachment to Lismoyle before he had time 

 to " make an example of himself," as one of the most un- 

 married of the majors observed, and into Captain Cursiter's 



