"Oh, sir, 'tis what I long for more than all else in the world! Let me follow you, and see if I am not a soldier born! I know something of fence now, and as for the rest, I will study at it night and day."
"You would prove an apt pupil, no doubt," said the Colonel; "and what says Angus?"
But to my shame Angus said nothing save "that he would see," and I knew well what that meant--it just meant no, in the most unsatisfactory and weary a manner a man can put it; but he proffered nothing further, and I was withheld by the presence of the company from expressing my thoughts.
But the Colonel only laughed with great good-nature, and said: "Well, well, when you make up your mind, let me know if it is favourable to me. As for you, you young fire-eater," he added, turning to me, "I won't have any runaways about me!" At which I was much abashed, as I could not protest that such a thought was foreign to me, for I was plotting at it even as he spoke. "If you join," he went on, "you must do so in such manner as will not shame your Uncle Scottos. I will see Father Urbani myself and find what he says about you; and if he gives you a good rating, and his permission, then you shall join like a gentleman." So with this I was forced to be content.
"Well, Angus," I began, the moment we were in the street, "a pretty shewing you have made for yourself with your 'we will sees' before gentlemen! I hope you are well satisfied?"
"I'm not exactly put out," says he, very dry.
"Indeed? And you call yourself Clanranald!" I snorted, full of scorn.
"My father always told me I had every right to!" says he, provoking me to the utmost with his pretended quiet. "And what is more, I never yet heard that any of my name must needs take up with the first recruiting-officer he comes across."
"Angus McDonald!" I cried, "if we weren't in the open street I'd thrash you within an inch of your life!"
"Oh no, you wouldn't, nor yet within a mile of it! I'm no more afraid of you than I am of the Irish officers you're so hot after."
Fortunate it was for the good name of the college that we caught sight of the Superior at that moment, for I do not believe human patience could have held out longer than mine had done. Indeed, so much was I exercised that the Superior saw at once something was wrong, and it was with the greatest difficulty we contrived to keep our cause of difference from him.