One described Napoleon’s battles and the other was an expansive description of the addition of some new pictures to the Louvre.
He had been fortunate enough to buy one of them in Singapore and to purloin the other from the Governor’s secretary the moment it arrived in a consignment of books from Europe.
The Rajah was delighted and he spoke to Lord Saire in not quite such a dictatorial way as he addressed other people.
Lady Brooke had been beautiful in her youth and adored gaiety, but she had suffered a great tragedy in her life.
Her first three children, a girl and twin boys, returning to England on the P. & O. steamer Hydaspes in 1873, had all died within a few hours of one another.
One day they were quite well, the next they were gasping for breath in the heat of the Red Sea. No one
