Angel: A sketch in Indian ink

IT was the middle of March in the North-West Provinces, and the hot weather had despatched several heralds to Ramghur, announcing its imminent approach. Punkahs were swinging la...

BEFORE the station clock had chimed six the following morning, every soul in the Wilkinsons' bungalow was astir. The portly head of the house, clad in lily-white drill, and moun...

ANIMA ayah pounced upon the gage thus recklessly flung at her, and was proceeding to pour out the seven vials of her wrath in a lava-like stream, when, luckily for her challenge...

PUNCTUAL to the moment, Philip Gascoigne arrived to take his little cousin for the promised drive, and Angel's eyes shone like stars when she descried his smart dogcart spinning...

Oh, Lucknow road! How many times have you resounded to the steady tramp of armed men, the clattering of hoofs, the rumble of guns! What battles have been fought to guard you, wh...

THE bungalow occupied by Captain Gascoigne and his friend was one of the largest in Ramghur. Sixty years previously, it had been the residence of the general commanding the dist...

THE hot weather was in full possession of Ramghur, and, as a natural consequence, the station became deserted. Various bragging individuals, who had announced their determinatio...

THE ruthless destruction of Mrs. Dawson's dresses supplied a subject for conversation, not merely in the station, but also in the "Burra Bazaar," where the most private concerns...

ALTHOUGH the temperature was that of a bake-house, and not a breath of air stirred the drowsy bamboos, or the long seed-pods of the bare acacias; yet, as Mrs. Wilkinson was driv...

THUS ended the butterfly career of pretty Lena Wilkinson, who looked surprisingly fair and girlish, as she lay with her hands crossed on her heart, surrounded by white flowers....

THE monsoon had broken at last, and the rain descended and the floods came in drenching sheets. Red plains sprang to life, and became a delicate green, frogs croaked hilariously...

IT was the evening before Angel's departure for England. Her luggage was carefully labelled, her roll of wraps was strapped, all arrangements were complete. She was to travel un...

LADY AUGUSTA GASCOIGNE was the daughter of a marquis, the widow of a baronet, and our little Angel's grandmamma. She lived in a small house in Hill Street, with her daughter Eva...

PHILIP GASCOIGNE, whom this history chiefly concerns, was the only child of a distinguished officer who late in life had prevailed on a beautiful and charming woman to accept hi...

SINCE Angel had left Ramghur the hot winds of three seasons had swept over her mother's grave, killed the plants in pots, and defaced the lettering on the cheap headstone (Mr. S...

THREE weeks later, on a broiling June afternoon, as Angel and her guardian were strolling down the shady side of Bond Street on their way to strawberry ices, they passed a carri...

IT was the month of September in the Himalayas, when the rains are heaviest, landslips frequent, and whole hillsides crumble and slide into the valley with a sound of thunder, t...

"There are no flowers, or dessert, but there's some chocolate—and see that the cook does not spare his stores, and has an eye to the ayah and coolies; they have all to be ready...

THE morning succeeding the arrivals, and the storm, was cloudless. There are few things more beautiful, or more treacherous, than a break in the rains in the Himalayas. The sun...

CAPTAIN SHAFTO was taking tea with Mrs. Gordon in the great important looking drawing-room, which befitted the wife of a Commissioner, and future Lieutenant-Governor. She was, a...

THE Reverend Arthur Eliot, "Padre Eliot," as his people called him, was a notable figure in society, an active, well-built man of six or seven and thirty, with a square, clean-s...

THE tour of a Commissioner in camp in the cold weather means a march from place to place, visiting certain villages and districts, holding official courts for the inhabitants, g...

A TELEGRAPH peon and a mounted orderly are passing through an entrance gate on which we find a board inscribed "Lieutenant-Colonel Gascoigne, R.E." It leads to a large bungalow,...

WEEK by week the great camp moved on in its stately, deliberate fashion, through its accustomed districts. There was not as much variety in the daily life as in the ever changin...

THIS long, leisurely tour through the crops, the villages, the jungles, brought Angel into more intimate touch with India than in all the previous years she had been in the coun...

SEVERAL guests from the station were added to the camp dinner table, the Commissioner's Khansamah contrived an impressive _mènu_, and a dazzling display of plate and flowers. Th...

COLONEL and Mrs. Gascoigne sat in their cool matted verandah drinking early morning tea, and watching the malees splashing water over the plants from their primitive earthern ch...

DURING that long official feast, Angel's thoughts were distracted and confused. They were engrossed by a couple lower down the table—of these she could only catch occasional gli...

RESIDENCY parties invariably broke up in good time, and it was not more than half-past ten when Colonel Gascoigne handed his wife into her brougham, and set off, according to hi...

BEFORE continuing this history, it is necessary to say a few words respecting Lola Waldershare. As Lola Hargreaves, ever lovely, seductive, and smiling, by strangers and mere ac...

MRS. WALDERSHARE presented a most charming picture, as she rustled into Mrs. Gascoigne's great drawing-room, with her exquisitely gloved hands eagerly extended. Her _entrée_ was...

IN a surprisingly short time, Mrs. Waldershare had become one of the most interesting personalities in Marwar. Her beauty, her toilettes, her seductive manners, her air of being...

"BUT you cannot study the Rajah's pictures any longer," continued Colonel Gascoigne, in a rough and dominant tone, and as he spoke he struck a match, and confronted, as he antic...

IT was seven o'clock in the morning, and under the neem trees at the far side of the parade-ground, Mrs. Gordon and Mrs. Gascoigne are walking their horses side by side. The for...

THE unexpected guest, pleading a nervous headache (the result of fright), did not appear at tiffin, but emerged later in the afternoon, wearing a subdued expression, and a fanta...

AND thus Mrs. Waldershare was established as Mrs. Gascoigne's chaperone and companion; and the station, who considered it a most excellent arrangement, and but yet another proof...

ROCKSTONE Chotah-Bilat, the joint address of Mrs. Gascoigne and Mrs. Waldershare, was a large well-appointed bungalow, overlooking the prettiest side of the station, approached...

"SEE what a magnet you are!" cried Sir Capel, striking a comic attitude as Angel descended the path towards him—the other travellers had passed on unconscious of her vicinity.

THE search in Angel's hut proved fruitless, although the dhurries were taken up, and the ayah passed her slim nervous hand over every inch of the floor, whilst her mistress held...

THE great Chamoli landslip thus fulfilled its threat; the long-expected catastrophe had come, and gone. The lake had fallen five hundred feet in two hours, and worked the antici...