walls and were lost in
the darkness of the roof. A muffled sound of voices came from the other
side of the door panels, but the hall itself was silent. Harry stood
remarkably still, and the only thing which moved at all was the yellow
flame of the candle as it flickered apparently in some faint draught.
The light wavered across the portraits, glowing here upon a red coat,
glittering there upon a corselet of steel. For there was not one man's
portrait upon the walls which did not glisten with the colours of a
uniform, and there were the portraits of many men. Father and son, the
Fevershams had been soldiers from the very birth of the family. Father
and son, in lace collars and bucket boots, in Ramillies wigs and steel
breastplates, in velvet coats, with powder on their hair, in shakos and
swallow-tails, in high stocks and frogged coats, they looked down upon
this last Feversham, summoning him to the like service. They were men of
one stamp; no distinction of uniform could obscure their
relationship--lean-faced men, hard as iron, rugged in feature,
thin-lipped, with firm chins and straight, level mouths, narrow
foreheads, and the steel-blue inexpressive eyes; men of courage and
resolution, no doubt, but without subtleties, or nerves, or that
burdensome gift of imagination; sturdy men, a little wanting in
delicacy, hardly conspicuous for intellect; to put it frankly, men
rather stupid--all of them, in a word, first-class fighting men, but
not one of them a first-class soldier.

But Harry Feversham plainly saw none of their defects. To him they
were one and all portentous and terrible. He stood before them in the
attitude of a criminal before his judges, reading his condemnation in
their cold unchanging eyes. Lieutenant Sutch understood more clearly why
the flame of the candle flickered. There was no draught in the hall, but
the boy's hand shook. And finally, as though he heard the mute voices of
his judges delivering sentence and admitted its justice, he actually
bowed to the portraits on the wall. As he raised his head, he saw
Lieutenant Sutch in the embrasure of the doorway.

He did not start, he uttered no word; he let his eyes quietly rest upon
Sutch and waited. Of the two it was the man who was embarrassed.

"Harry," he said, and in spite of his embarrassment he had the tact to
use the tone and the language of one addressing not a boy, but a comrade
equal in years, "we meet for the first time to-night. But I knew y