San Antonio daily light. [volume] (San Antonio, Tex.) 1886-1907, 1896-01-13

straw colored mustache. Aggie had al
ways had a sneaking fancy for straw
color. And besides he was soldier and
aid de camp to the lieutenant governor
of somewhere up country. (Aggie's
Indian geography was as deliciously
vague as an Indian secretary's, and
somewhere up country" was about as
definite to her as any particular name
of any particular district. She regarded
all India, indeed, as naturally divided
into two main parts-the part where
Phil was stationed and the part where
he wasn't. Further than that she never
tried to go. When people ON board talk
ed to her glibly of the Punjab, or the
Central Provinces, Saharanpur, or Mu-
zaffargarh, she nodded and smiled
benign acquiescence, CLOSING over her
ignorance with the charm of her man
ner.
Aggie and the handsome young man
got ON together admirably. He was
certain Captain Angus Stuart-conjec-
tured from his name to be of Scotch ex-
traction-and he had fallen victim to
Aggie's fluffy hair the very first moment
he ever set eyes ON her. Indeed he had
talked to her for half an hour ON deck
in Brindisi harbor and been desolated to
learn by that time that she was not
only engaged, but actually going out to
India to get married. Nay, he even re-
fiected with certain bland pleasure at
that early stage of their brief acquaint-
ance that there's many slip 'twixt the
cup and the lip and that people who
go out to India to get married don't al
ways persevere in their prime intention
when they see their beloved in his In
dian avatar. Had it not been for that
slight hope Captain Stuart would have
avoided talking to Aggie altogether, for
being Scotchman he'was of course
both prudent and superstitious, and he
felt the very instant he began to talk to
her that here at last was his undoubted
affinity.
If you have ever lain at anchor in
Brindisi harbor, or ever made trip
from thence by P. and O. to Port Said,
you will be we'll aware that there's
nothing for a sensible man to do with
his time as he skirts the shadowy coast
of Crete but to make love to some fit
and proper person. Now Angus Stuart
was most sensible man, and though he
had too great a respect for vested inter-
ests exactly to make love to another fell
lows affianced bride ON her way out to
Bombay to join her future husband, yet
it must be candidly admitted by an i'm
partial historian that he sailed very close
to the wind indeed in that respect and
made himself remarkably agreeable to
Aggie She had a chaperon, of course.
No well conducted young woman could
trust herself to the Mediterranean and
the Indian ocean without the services of
a chaperon, but what s the use of that in
dispensable article in every young ladys
wardrobe, venture to ask, if it persists
in being seasick and sticking to its berth
the whole way out from London to
Alden? The consequence was that Aggle
and Captain Stuart were thrown great
deal together during the course of their
voyage When Aggie sang to the PENN
sular and Oriental piano in the big sa-
loon, it was Angus Stuart who turned
over the leaves of her music book. When
Aggie sat on deck and declined lunch
with thanks, for pressing reasons, it was
Angus Stuart who brought her up the
unsugared lemonade and one dry biscuit
which alone appealed to her maritime
appetite. Old ladies on board remarked
with malicious glee what pity it was
poor dear Mrs. Mackinnon wasn't well
enough to come up and look after her
charge. Old gentlemen observed with
knowing smile that Miss Oswald was
going out to be married at Bombay, but
they rather imagined she'd mistaken
the bridegroom.
Aggie and Angus Stuart, however,
went on happily unconscious of the un-
kind remarks whispered about them in
confidence in the saloon at night when
they two engaged in admiring on deck
the phosphorescence on. the waves or the
very singular brilliancy of the tropical
moonlight.
On one such evening, in the Red sea,
they stood together by the taffrail with
one accord and looked over in unison
into the deep white water. There was
silence for awhile. Then Stuart spoke
abruptly.
"You haven t seen him for five years, "
he said meditatively, without anything
special to indicate the personality of the
him in question. That's very long
time, you know, Miss Oswald. At your
age and his in five years people often
alter wonderfully" (Being himself
Just 80, and square built at that, Angus
Stuart affected always to speak to Aggie
in the character of "a grandfather
"Oh, 1 hope notp' Aggie cried fer
vently, with little shudder of alarm,