Amongst many various, and no doubt useful, functions, Miss Delia Wall performed that of gossip and newsagent-general to the village of Inkston. A hard-featured, swarthy spinster of forty, with a roving, inquisitive, yet not unkindly eye, she perambulated—or rather percycled—the district, taking stock of every incident. Not a cat could kitten or a dog have the mange without her privity; critics of her mental activity went near to insinuating connivance. Naturally, therefore, she was well acquainted with the new development at Tower Cottage, although the isolated position of that dwelling made thorough observation piquantly difficult. She laid her information before an attentive, if not very respectful, audience gathered round the tea-table at Old Place, the Naylors' handsome house on the outskirts of Sprotsfield and on the far side of the heath from Inkston. She was enjoying herself, although she was, as usual, a trifle distrustful of the quality of Mr. Naylor's smile; it smacked of the satiric. "He looks at you as if you were a specimen," she had once been heard to complain; and, when she said "specimen," it was obviously beetles that she had in mind.

"Everybody knows old Mr. Saffron—by sight, I mean—and the woman who does for him," she said. "There's never been anything remarkable about them. He took his walk as regular as clock-work every afternoon, and she bought just the same things every week; her books must have tallied almost to a penny every month, Mrs. Naylor! I know it! And it was a very rare thing indeed for Mr. Saffron to go to London, though I have known him to be away once or twice; but very, very rarely!" She paused and added dramatically, "Until the armistice!"

"Full of ramifications, that event, Miss Wall. It affects even my business." Mr. Naylor, though now withdrawn from an active share in its conduct, was still interested in the large shipping firm from which he had drawn his comfortable fortune.

She looked at him suspiciously, as he put the ends of the slender white fingers of his two hands together, and leant forward to listen—with that smile of his and eyes faintly twinkling. But the problem was seething in her brain; she had to go on.

"A week after the armistice Mr. Saffron went to London by the 9.50. He travelled first, Anna."

"Did he, dear?" Mrs. Naylor, a stout and placid dame, was not yet stirred to excitement.

"He came down by the 4.11, and those two men with him. And they've been there ever since!"

"Two men, Delia! I've only seen one."

"Oh yes, there's another! Sergeant Hooper they call him; a short thickset man with a black moustache. He buys two bottles of rum every week at the 'Green Man.' And—one minute, please, Mr. Naylor——"

"I was only going to say that it looks to me as if this man Hooper were, or had been, a soldier. What do you think?"

"Never mind papa! Go on, Miss Wall. I'm interested." This encouragement came from Gertie Naylor, a pretty girl of seventeen who was consuming much tea, bread, and honey.

"And since then the old gentleman and this Mr. Beaumaroy go to town regularly every week on Wednesdays! Now who are they, how did Mr. Saffron get hold of them, and what are they doing here? I'm at a loss, Anna."

Apparently an impasse! And Mr. Naylor did not seem to assist matters by asking whether Miss Wall had kept a constant eye on the Agony Column. Mrs. Naylor took up her knitting and switched off to another topic.

"Dr. Arkroyd's friend, Delia dear! What a charming girl she looks!"

"Friend, Anna? I didn't know that! A patient, I understand, anyhow. She's taking Valentine's beef juice. Of course they do give that in drink cases, but I should be sorry to think——"

"Drugs, more likely," Mr. Naylor suavely interposed. Then he rose from his chair and began to pace slowly up and down the long room, looking at his beautiful pictures, his beautiful china, his beautiful chairs, all the beautiful things that were his. His family took no notice of this roving up and down; it was a habit, and was tacitly accepted as meaning that he had—for the moment—had enough of the company, and even of his own sallies at its expense.

"I've asked Dr. Arkroyd to bring her over—Miss Walford, I mean—the first day it's fine enough for tennis," Mrs. Naylor pursued. There was a hard court at Old Place, so that winter did not stop the game entirely.

"What a name, too!"

"Walford? It's quite a good name, Delia."

"No, no, Anna! Beaumaroy, of course." Miss Wall was back at the larger problem.

"There's Alec's voice—he and the General are back from their golf. Ring for another teapot, Gertie dear."

The door opened; not Alec but the General came in, and closed the door carefully behind him; it was obviously an act of precaution and not merely a normal exercise of good manners. Then he walked up to his hostess and said, "It's not my fault, Anna. Alec would do it, though I shook my head at him, behind the fellow's back."

"What do you mean, General?" cried the hostess. Mr. Naylor, for his part, stopped roving.

The door again! "Come in, Mr. Beaumaroy—here's tea."

Mr. Beaumaroy obediently entered, in the wake of Captain Alec Naylor, who duly presented him to Mrs. Naylor, adding that Beaumaroy had been kind enough to make the fourth in a game with the General, the Rector of Sprotsfield, and himself. "And he and the parson were too tough a nut for us, weren't they, sir?" he added to the General.

Besides being an excellent officer and a capital fellow, Alec Naylor was also reputed to be one of the handsomest men in the Service; six feet three, very straight, very fair, with features as regular as any romantic hero of them all, and eyes as blue. The honourable limp that at present marked his movements would, it was hoped, pass away. Even his own family were often surprised into a new admiration of his physical perfections, remarking, one to the other, how Alec took the shine out of every other man in the room.

There was no shine—no external obvious shine—to take out of Mr. Beaumaroy—Miss Wall's puzzling, unaccounted-for Mr. Beaumaroy. The light showed him now more clearly than when Mary Arkroyd met him on the heath road, but perhaps thereby did him no service. His features, though irregular, were not ugly or insignificant, but he wore a rather battered aspect; there were deep lines running from the corners of his mouth, and crowsfeet had started under the grey eyes which, in their turn, looked more sceptical than ardent, rather mocking than eager. Yet when he smiled, his face became not merely pleasant, but confidentially pleasant; he seemed to smile especially to and for the person to whom he was talking; and his voice was notably agreeable, soft and clear—the voice of a high-bred man, but not exactly of a high-bred Englishman. There was no accent definite enough to be called foreign, certainly not to be assigned to any particular race; but there was an exotic touch about his manner of speech suggesting that, even if not that of a foreigner, it was shaped and coloured by the inflexions of foreign tongues. The hue of his plentiful and curly hair, indistinguishable to Mary and Cynthia, now stood revealed as neither black, nor red, nor auburn, nor brown, nor golden, but just—and rather surprisingly—a plain yellow, the colour of a cowslip or thereabouts. Altogether rather a rum-looking fellow! This had been Alec Naylor's first remark when the Rector of Sprotsfield pointed him out, as a possible fourth, at the golf club, and the rough justice of the description could not be denied. He, like Alec, bore his scars; the little finger of his right hand was amputated down to the knuckle.

Yet, after all this description—in particularity, if not otherwise, worthy of a classic novelist—the thing still remains that most struck observers. Mr. Hector Beaumaroy had an adorable candour of manner. He answered questions with innocent readiness and pellucid sincerity. It would be impossible to think him guilty of a lie; ungenerous to suspect so much as a suppression of the truth. Even Mr. Naylor, hardened by five-and-thirty years' experience of what sailors will blandly swear to in collision cases, was struck with the open candour of his bearing.

"Yes," he said. "Yes, Miss Wall, that's right, we go to town every Wednesday. No particular reason why it should be Wednesday, but old gentlemen somehow do better—don't you think so?—with method and regular habits."

"I'm sure you know what's best for Mr. Saffron," said Delia. "You've known him a long time, haven't you?"

Mr. Naylor drew a little nearer and listened. The General had put himself into the corner—a remote corner of the room—and sat there with an uneasy and rather glowering aspect.

"Oh, no, no!" answered Beaumaroy. "A matter of weeks only. But the dear old fellow seemed to take to me—a friend put us in touch originally. I seem to be able to do just what he wants."

"I hope your friend is not really ill—not seriously?" This time the question was Mrs. Naylor's, not Miss Delia's.

"His health is really not so bad, but"—he gave a glance round the company, as though inviting their understanding—"he insists that he's not the man he was."

"Absurd!" smiled Naylor. "Not much older than I am, is he?"

"Only just turned seventy, I believe. But the idea's very persistent."

"Hypochondria!" snapped Miss Delia.

"Not altogether. I'm afraid there is a little real heart trouble. Dr. Irechester——"

"Oh, with Dr. Irechester, dear Mr. Beaumaroy, you're all right!"

Again Beaumaroy's glance—that glance of innocent appeal—ranged over the company (except the General, out of its reach). He seemed troubled and embarrassed.

"A most accomplished man, evidently, and a friend of yours, of course. But—well, there it is—a mere fancy, of course, but unhappily my old friend doesn't take to him. He—he thinks that he's rather inquisitorial. A doctor's duty, I suppose——"

"Irechester's a sound man, a very sound man," said Mr. Naylor. "And, after all, one can ask almost any question if one does it tactfully—can't one, Miss Wall?"

"As a matter of fact, he's only seen Mr. Saffron twice—he had a little chill. But his manner, unfortunately, rather—er—alarmed——"

Gertie Naylor, with the directness of youth, propounded a solution of the difficulty. "If you don't like Dr. Irechester——"

"Oh, it's not I who——"

"Why not have Mary?" Gertie made her suggestion eagerly. She was very fond of Mary, who, from the height of age, wisdom, and professional dignity, had stooped to offer her an equal friendship.

"She means Dr. Mary Arkroyd," Mrs. Naylor explained.

"Yes, I know, Mrs. Naylor—I know about Dr. Arkroyd. In fact, I know her by sight. But——"

"Perhaps you don't believe in women doctors?" Alec suggested.

"It's not that. I've no prejudices. But the responsibility is on me, and I know very little of her; and—well, to change one's doctor—it's rather invidious——"

"Oh, as to that, Irechester's a sensible man; he's got as much work as he wants, and as much money too. He won't resent an old man's fancy."

"Well, I'd never thought of a change, but if you all suggest it——" Somehow it did seem as if they all—and not merely youthful Gertie—had suggested it. "But I should rather like to know Dr. Arkroyd first."

"Come and meet her here; that's very simple. She often comes to tennis and tea. We'll let you know the first time she's coming."

Beaumaroy most cordially accepted the idea—and the invitation. "Any afternoon I shall be delighted—except Wednesdays. Wednesdays are sacred—aren't they, Miss Wall? London on Wednesdays for Mr. Saffron and me—and the old brown bag!" He laughed in a quiet merriment. "That old bag's been in a lot of places with me and has carried some queer cargoes. Now it just goes to and fro, between here and town, with Mudie books. Must have books, living so much alone as we do!" He had risen as he spoke, and approached Mrs. Naylor to take leave.

She gave him her hand very cordially. "I don't suppose Mr. Saffron cares to meet people; but any spare time you have, Mr. Beaumaroy, we shall be delighted to see you."

Beaumaroy bowed as he thanked her, adding, "And I'm promised a chance of meeting Dr. Arkroyd before long?"

The promise was renewed, and the visitor took his leave, declining Alec's offer to "run him home" in the car. "The car might startle my old friend," he pleaded. Alec saw him off, and returned to find the General, who had contrived to avoid more than a distant bow of farewell to Beaumaroy, standing on the hearthrug, apparently in a state of some agitation.

The envious years had refused to Major-General Punnit, C.B.—he was a distant cousin of Mrs. Naylor's—the privilege of serving his country in the Great War. His career had lain mainly in India and was mostly behind him even at the date of the South African War, in which, however, he had done valuable work in one of the supply services. He was short, stout, honest, brave, shrewd, obstinate, and as full of prejudices, religious, political, and personal, as an egg is of meat. And all this time he had been slowly and painfully recalling what his young friend Colonel Merman (the Colonel was young only relatively to the General) had told him about Hector Beaumaroy. The name had struck on his memory the moment the Rector pronounced it, but it had taken him a long while to "place it" accurately. However, now he had it pat; the conversation in the club came back. He retailed it now to the company at Old Place.

A pleasant fellow, Beaumaroy, socially a very agreeable fellow. And as for courage, as brave as you like. Indeed he might have had letters after his name save for the fact that he—the Colonel—would never recommend a man unless his discipline was as good as his leading, and his conduct at the base as praiseworthy as at the front. (Alec Naylor nodded his handsome head in grave approval; his father looked a little discontented, as though he were swallowing unpalatable, though wholesome, food.) His whole idea—Beaumaroy's, that is—was to shield offenders, to prevent the punishment fitting the crime, even to console and countenance the wrongdoer. No sense of discipline, no moral sense—the Colonel had gone as far as that. Impossible to promote or to recommend for reward—almost impossible to keep. Of course, if he had been caught young and put through the mill, it might have been different—"it might"—the Colonel heavily underlined the possibility—but he came from Heaven knew where, after a life spent Heaven knew how. "And he seemed to know it himself," the Colonel had said, thoughtfully rolling his port round in the glass. "Whenever I wigged him, he offered to go—said he'd chuck his commission and enlist—said he'd be happier in the ranks. But I was weak, I couldn't bear to do it." After thus quoting his friend, the General added: "He was weak—damned weak—and I told him so."

"Of course he ought to have got rid of him," said Alec. "Still, sir, there's nothing—er—disgraceful."

"It seems hardly to have come to that," the General admitted reluctantly.

"It all rather makes me like him," Gertie affirmed courageously.

"I think that, on the whole, we may venture to know him in times of peace," Mr. Naylor summed up.

"That's your look out," remarked the General. "I've warned you. You can do as you like."

Delia Wall had sat silent through the story. Now she spoke up and got back to the real point:

"There's nothing in all that to show how he comes to be at Mr. Saffron's."

The General shrugged his shoulders. "Oh, Saffron be hanged! He's not the British Army," he said.