Everyone was out
of temper, and a mouse would not have dared squeak on board the ship. I
have had a bad time of it since the day we lost you."
"Oh, well, you will have plenty of chances yet, Dicky."
"It has not been the same thing since you have gone, Terence," he
grumbled. "Of course we could not always be having fun; but you know that
we were always putting our heads together and talking over what might be
done. It was good fun, even if we could not carry it out. I tried to stir
up the others of our lot, but they don't seem to have it in them. I wish
you could get me transferred to your regiment. I know that we should have
plenty of fun there."
"I am afraid that it could not be done, Dicky, though I should like it
immensely. But you see you have not learned a word of Portuguese, and you
would be of no use in the world."
"There it is, you see," O'Grady said. "That is one of the points which had
no luck in it, Terence. You were always trying to talk away with the
peasants; and, riding about as you did as Fane's aide-de-camp, you had
opportunities of doing so and made the most of them. Now there are not
three other fellows in the regiment who can ask a simple question. I can
shout _Carajo!__ at a mule-driver who loiters behind, and can add two or
three other strong Portuguese words, but there is an end of it.
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