WILLIAM THE CONQUEROR
but she would n't hear of any compromise. A woman 's entitled to travel with her husband if she wants to; and William says she 's on the same footing. You see, we Ve been together all our lives, more or less, since my people died. It is n't as if she were an ordinary sister."
"All the sisters I 've ever heard of would have stayed where they were well off."
"She 's as clever as a man, confound her," Martyn went on. "She broke up the bungalow over my head while I was talking at her. 'Settled the whole thing in three hours—servants, horses, and all. I did n't get my orders till nine."
"Jimmy Hawkins won't be pleased," said Scott. "A famine 's no place for a woman."
"Mrs. Jim—I mean Lady Jim 's in camp with him. At any rate, she says she will look after my sister. "William wired down to her on her own responsibility, asking if she could come, and knocked the ground from under me by showing me her answer."
Scott laughed aloud. "If she can do that she can take care of herself, and Mrs. Jim won't let her run into any mischief. There are n't many women, sisters or wives, who would walk into a famine with their eyes open. It is n't as if she did n't know what these things mean. She was through the Jaloo cholera last year."
The train stopped at Amritsar, and Scott went back to the ladies' compartment, immediately behind their carriage. William, with a cloth riding-cap on her curls, nodded affably.
[205]
