"Your colonel could not have thought that it was luck
when he wrote the report about that adventure at sea, and your general
could not have thought so, either, or he would not have praised you in his
despatch. Then, you know, General Fane must have thought that it was quite
out of the way or he would not have chosen you to be on his staff. Then
afterwards the other general must have been pleased with you, or he would
not have put you on his staff and sent you off on a mission to General
Romana. It is quite certain that these things could not have been all
luck, Terence. And anyhow, you cannot pretend that it was luck that this
regiment of yours fought so well against the French, while none of the
others seem to have fought at all. I suppose that you will say next that
it was all luck that you got me out of the convent."
"There was a great deal of luck in it, Mary. If that cowardly bishop
hadn't left Oporto secretly, after declaring that he would defend it until
the last, I could never have got his ring."
"You would have got me out some other way if he hadn't," the girl said,
with confidence. "No, Terence, you can say what you like, but I shall
always consider that you have been wonderfully brave and clever."
"Then you will always think quite wrong," Terence said, bluntly.
"I shall begin to think that you are a tyrant, like the Bishop of Oporto,
if you speak in that positive way.
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