Heron Baynet arrived at Sunflowers on Christmas Eve. Nothing about the house suggested tragedy: the hedges were clipped, the ground dug; holly decked the hall; above the oak dining-table hung a bunch of mistletoe; Peter’s study had been cleared for the children’s tree and presents. The day itself brought its usual gift-giving, its usual church-going, the usual roast-beef for lunch, the usual turkey, the usual champagne—and Francis Gordon who hobbled through Tebbits’ cowyard in full evening-kit and a fur-coat—for dinner.

The usual Christmas dinner-party! Yet all through it, Heron Baynet felt conscious of tension. To his professional mind, these three fairly ordinary people—the young wife, the convalescent and the invalided soldier—seemed somehow out of tune with the world and with each other; he sensed discord in the apparent harmony of their even small-talk. Instinctively, he began to analyse them, to look for tangible symptoms of that intangible tension.

What could be the trouble? Covertly, he studied Peter. The man looked thin, of course: that was to be expected after his illness. He spoke rather more slowly than usual, drank more than his share of wine, seemed to grip knife and fork.... “I wonder,” thought Heron Baynet. Then Fanny, entering hurriedly, caught her foot in the edge of the carpet, stumbled, recovered her balance. The doctor saw Peter’s face twitch for the fraction of a second; saw the lower jaw drop, jerk back into position as the fifth nerve sent its message of control from the taut brain. “Poor devil,” thought Heron Baynet....

In the light of that subtle revelation, many things became clear to the neurologist’s mind: he understood his daughter’s occasional glances at her husband, Peter’s carefully modulated voice, the whole atmosphere of watchful distrust in which these two must have been living since his son-in-law returned from hospital. Professional instinct satisfied, he turned his attention to Francis.

But nothing in Francis Gordon’s demeanour betrayed tension. On the contrary, he seemed—compared with the super-alertness of Peter and Patricia—a mind gone mute. He talked, and he ate, and he drank, like an automaton....

Meal over, Patricia left her three men alone in the small candle-lit dining-room. The maid brought coffee; Peter produced cigars. They talked for a little about the fall of the Asquith Cabinet, Lloyd George, Tanks, the chances of America coming in.

The last topic seemed to strike a responsive chord in Francis Gordon’s mind. His eyes brightened to it for a moment: then the flame in them went dead. Peter told about Charlie Henry; Heron Baynet led him from that to his own wounding.

“I don’t remember much after I was hit,” said Peter, and shied off the subject.

“But were you unconscious all the way to England?”

“I suppose so.”

Conversation languished for a moment. Then Peter edged his chair towards his father-in-law’s; began to talk medicine. Peter opened very carefully, feeling his way with each sentence towards the topic which for the moment obsessed him: but it did not take the doctor’s astute mind very long to realize that he was being pumped for information. And the information his son-in-law sought was all about one subject—tubercle. “At what age were people most liable to consumption?” “How did it start?” “Was it hereditary?” “How long did it take to kill a man?” “Could it be cured?” ...

“Now why on earth,” thought Heron Baynet, “does a man who is obviously suffering from repressed shell-shock, want to know about tubercle?” And that night he sat up very late, peering into the flames of the wood-fire in his bed-room, seeing visions of this new science, the science of neurology, by which men who had learned how to die might be taught how to live.