The dancing done, he pumped hands, slapped backs and left. His walk back to the Mess was the loneliest of his life.
***
‘Come on, Morgan, there’s no point in loafing here.’
The days since the wedding had been frantic as last-minute preparations were made for departure and this was to be the regiment’s last evening in Weedon, for tomorrow they were to leave for Portsmouth and embarkation for the mysterious ‘East’. So, Morgan had accepted Carmichael’s invitation to join him at his rooms in Weedon to ‘raise Cain’.
Carmichael’s idea of Cain-raising held little appeal to Morgan. He already spent more than enough time with the regiment’s foremost scion and self-appointed rake and, besides, any quiet moment allowed his thoughts to drift back to Mary, of seeing her all the time yet knowing tha
