n jerked open; a gladstone, a suit-case,
and a kit-bag shot at him; largesse had changed hands; the door had shut
again; the train had groaned and started; and Peter was off to France.

It was with mixed feelings that he groped for his luggage. He was
conscious of wanting a seat and a breakfast; he was also conscious of
wanting to look at the station he was leaving, which he dimly felt he
might never see again; and he was, above all, conscious that he looked a
fool and would like not to. In such a turmoil he lugged at the gladstone
and got it into a corner, and then turned to the window in the cleared
space with a determination. In turning he caught the Captain's face stuck
round the little door. It was withdrawn at once, but came out again, and
he heard for the second time the unfamiliar title:

"Say, padre; come in here. There's room after all."

Peter felt cheered. He staggered to the door, and found the others busy
making room. A subaltern of the A.S.C. gripped his small attache case and
swung it up on to the rack. The South African pulled a British warm off
the vacant seat and reached out for the suit-case. And the third man, with
the rank of a Major and the badge of a bursting bomb, struck a match and
paused as he lit a cigarette to jerk out:

"Damned full train! We ought to have missed it, Donovan."

"It's a good stunt that, if too many blighters don't try it on," observed
the subaltern, reaching for Peter's warm. "But they did my last leave,
and I got the devil of a choking off from the brass-hat in charge. It's
the Staff train, and they only take Prime Ministers, journalists, and
trade-union officials in addition. How's that, padre?"

"Thanks," said Peter, subsiding. "It's jolly good of you to take me in. I
thought I'd got to stand from here to Folkestone."

H.P. Jenks, Second-Lieutenant A.S.C., regarded him seriously. "It
couldn't be done, padre," he said, "not at this hour of the morning. I
left Ealing about midnight more or less, got sandwiched in the Metro with
a Brigadier-General and his blooming wife and daughters, and had to wait
God knows how long for the R.T.O. If I couldn't get a seat and a break
after that, I'd be a casualty, sure thing."

"It's your own fault for going home last night," observed the Major
judiciously. (Peter noticed that he was little older than Jenks on
inspection.) "Gad, Donovan, you should have been with us at the Adelphi!
It was some do, I can tell you. And afterwards..."