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                            THE LOST HEIR

                            BY G. A. HENTY

AUTHOR OF "STURDY AND STRONG," "RUJUB, THE JUGGLER," "BY ENGLAND'S AID,"
ETC., ETC.


    THE MERSHON COMPANY
    RAHWAY, N. J.
    NEW YORK




CONTENTS.


       I. A BRAVE ACTION                      1

      II. IN THE SOUTH SEAS                  14

     III. A DEAF GIRL                        27

      IV. THE GYPSY                          40

       V. A GAMBLING DEN                     52

      VI. JOHN SIMCOE                        65

     VII. JOHN SIMCOE'S FRIEND               77

    VIII. GENERAL MATHIESON'S SEIZURE        90

      IX. A STRANGE ILLNESS                 102

       X. TWO HEAVY BLOWS                   112

      XI. A STARTLING WILL                  124

     XII. DR. LEEDS SPEAKS                  137

    XIII. NETTA VISITS STOWMARKET           150

     XIV. AN ADVERTISEMENT                  164

      XV. VERY BAD NEWS                     176

     XVI. A FRESH CLEW                      193

    XVII. NETTA ACTS INDEPENDENTLY          206

   XVIII. DOWN IN THE MARSHES               220

     XIX. A PARTIAL SUCCESS                 233

      XX. A DINNER PARTY                    247

     XXI. A BOX AT THE OPERA                262

    XXII. NEARING THE GOAL                  274

   XXIII. WALTER                            287

    XXIV. A NEW BARGE                       301

     XXV. A CRUSHING EXPOSURE               316

    XXVI. A LETTER FROM ABROAD              329




[Illustration: SIMCOE RAN IN WITH HIS KNIFE AND ATTACKED THE TIGER.
_--Page 4._]





THE LOST HEIR.




CHAPTER I.

A BRAVE ACTION.


A number of soldiers were standing in the road near the bungalow of
Brigadier-General Mathieson, the officer in command of the force in the
cantonments of Benares and the surrounding district.

"They are coming now, I think," one sergeant said to another. "It is a
bad business. They say the General is terribly hurt, and it was thought
better to bring him and the other fellow who was mixed up in it down in
doolies. I heard Captain Harvey say in the orderly-room that they have
arranged relays of bearers every five miles all the way down. He is a
good fellow is the General, and we should all miss him. He is not one of
the sort who has everything comfortable himself and don't care a rap how
the soldiers get on: he sees to the comfort of everyone and spends his
money freely, too. He don't seem to care what he lays out in making the
quarters of the married men comfortable, and in getting any amount of
ice for the hospital, and extra punkawallahs in the barrack rooms during
the hot season. He goes out and sees to everything himself. Why, on the
march I have known him, when all the doolies were full, give up his own
horse to a man who had fallen out. He has had bad luck too; lost his
wife years ago by cholera, and he has got no one to care for but his
girl. She was only a few months old when her mother died. Of course she
was sent off to England, and has been there ever since. He must be a
rich man, besides his pay and allowances; but it aint every rich man who
spends his money as he does. There won't be a dry eye in the cantonment
if he goes under."

"How was it the other man got hurt?"

"Well, I hear that the tiger sprang on to the General's elephant and
seized him by the leg. They both went off together, and the brute
shifted its hold to the shoulder, and carried him into the jungle; then
the other fellow slipped off his elephant and ran after the tiger. He
got badly mauled too; but he killed the brute and saved the General's
life."

"By Jove! that was a plucky thing. Who was he?"

"Why, he was the chap who was walking backwards and forwards with the
General when the band was playing yesterday evening. Several of the men
remarked how like he was to you, Sanderson. I noticed it, too. There
certainly was a strong likeness."

"Yes, some of the fellows were saying so," Sanderson replied. "He passed
close to me, and I saw that he was about my height and build, but of
course I did not notice the likeness; a man does not know his own face
much. Anyhow, he only sees his full face, and doesn't know how he looks
sideways. He is a civilian, isn't he?"

"Yes, I believe so; I know that the General is putting him up at his
quarters. He has been here about a week. I think he is some man from
England, traveling, I suppose, to see the world. I heard the Adjutant
speak of him as Mr. Simcoe when he was talking about the affair."

"Of course they will take him to the General's bungalow?"

"No; he is going to the next. Major Walker is away on leave, and the
doctor says that it is better that they should be in different
bungalows, because then if one gets delirious and noisy he won't disturb
the other. Dr. Hunter is going to take up his quarters there to look
after him, with his own servants and a couple of hospital orderlies."

By this time several officers were gathered at the entrance to the
General's bungalow, two mounted troopers having brought in the news a
few minutes before that the doolies were within a mile.

They came along now, each carried by four men, maintaining a swift but
smooth and steady pace, and abstaining from the monotonous chant usually
kept up. A doctor was riding by the side of the doolies, and two mounted
orderlies with baskets containing ice and surgical dressings rode fifty
paces in the rear. The curtains of the doolies had been removed to allow
of a free passage of air, and mosquito curtains hung round to prevent
insects annoying the sufferers.

There was a low murmur of sympathy from the soldiers as the doolies
passed them, and many a muttered "God bless you, sir, and bring you
through it all right." Then, as the injured men were carried into the
two bungalows, most of the soldiers strolled off, some, however,
remaining near in hopes of getting a favorable report from an orderly or
servant. A group of officers remained under the shade of a tree near
until the surgeon who had ridden in with the doolies came out.

"What is the report, McManus?" one of them asked, as he approached.

"There is no change since I sent off my report last night," he said.
"The General is very badly hurt; I certainly should not like to give an
opinion at present whether he will get over it or not. If he does it
will be a very narrow shave. He was insensible till we lifted him into
the doolie at eight o'clock yesterday evening, when the motion seemed to
rouse him a little, and he just opened his eyes; and each time we
changed bearers he has had a little ice between his lips, and a drink of
lime juice and water with a dash of brandy in it. He has known me each
time, and whispered a word or two, asking after the other."

"And how is he?"

"I have no doubt that he will do; that is, of course, if fever does not
set in badly. His wounds are not so severe as the General's, and he is a
much younger man, and, as I should say, with a good constitution. If
there is no complication he ought to be about again in a month's time.
He is perfectly sensible. Let him lie quiet for a day or two; after that
it would be as well if some of you who have met him at the General's
would drop in occasionally for a short chat with him; but of course we
must wait to see if there is going to be much fever."

"And did it happen as they say, doctor? The dispatch told us very little
beyond the fact that the General was thrown from his elephant, just as
the tiger sprang, and that it seized him and carried him into the
jungle; that Simcoe slipped off his pad and ran in and attacked the
tiger; that he saved the General's life and killed the animal, but is
sadly hurt himself."

"That is about it, except that he did not kill the tiger. Metcalf,
Colvin, and Smith all ran in, and firing together knocked it over stone
dead. It was an extraordinarily plucky action of Simcoe, for he had
emptied his rifle, and had nothing but it and a knife when he ran in."

"You don't say so! By Jove! that was an extraordinary act of pluck; one
would almost say of madness, if he hadn't succeeded in drawing the brute
off Mathieson, and so gaining time for the others to come up. It was a
miracle that he wasn't killed. Well, we shall not have quite so easy a
time of it for a bit. Of course Murdock, as senior officer, will take
command of the brigade, but he won't be half as considerate for our
comfort as Mathieson has been. He is rather a scoffer at what he calls
new-fangled ways, and he will be as likely to march the men out in the
heat of the day as at five in the morning."

The two sergeants who had been talking walked back together to their
quarters. Both of them were on the brigade staff. Sanderson was the
Paymaster's clerk, Nichol worked in the orderly-room. At the sergeants'
mess the conversation naturally turned on the tiger hunt and its
consequences.

"I have been in some tough fights," one of the older men said, "and I
don't know that I ever felt badly scared--one hasn't time to