THE WOMAN Summer in the Plains! Pitiless, burning summer! All day a blinding blaze of sun beat upon the wooden roof, forced a way through the shaded windows, lay like a blasting spell upon the parched compound.

The cluster-roses had shrivelled and died long since.

Their brown leaves still clung to the veranda and rattled desolately with a dry, scaly sound in the burning wind of dawn.
The green parakeets had ceased to look for sweets on the veranda.
Nothing dainty ever made its appearance there.

The Englishman who came and went with such grim endurance offered them no temptations.
Sometimes he spent the night on a _charpoy_ on the veranda, lying motionless, though often sleepless, through the breathless, dragging hours.

There had been sickness among the officers and Merryon, who was never sick, was doing the work of three men.