nace and he had come out pure
gold.

Doggie entered the familiar Deanery, and was met by Peggy with a glad
smile of welcome. His uncle, the Dean, appeared in the hall, florid,
whitehaired, benevolent, and extended both hands to the homecoming
warrior.

"My dear boy," he said, "how glad I am to see you! Welcome back! And
how's the wound?"

Opening the drawing-room door, he pushed Doggie inside. A tall, lean
figure in uniform, which had remained in the background by the
fireplace, advanced with outstretched hand.

"Hello, old chap!"

Doggie took the hand in an honest grip.

"Hello, Oliver!"

"How goes it?" asked Oliver.

"Splendid," said Doggie. "Are you all right?"

"Tip-top," answered Oliver. He clapped his cousin on the shoulder. "My
hat! you do look fit."

He turned to the Dean. "Uncle Edward, isn't he a hundred times the man
he was?"

In a little while tea came. It appeared to Doggie, handing round the
three-tiered cake-stand, that he had returned to some forgotten
existence. The delicate china cup in his hand seemed too frail for the
material usages of life, and he feared lest he break it, for Doggie was
accustomed to the rough dishes of the private.

The talk lay chiefly between Oliver and himself and ran on the war. Both
men had been at Ypres and at Arras, where the British and German
trenches lay only five yards apart.

"I ought to be over there now," said Oliver, "but I just escaped
shell-shock and I was sent home for two weeks."

"My crowd is at the Somme," said Doggie.

"You're well out of it, old chap," laughed Oliver.

For the first time in his life Doggie began really to like Oliver.
Oliver stood in his eyes in a new light, that of the typical officer,
trusted and beloved by his men, and Doggie's heart went out to him.

After some further talk, the men separated to dress for dinner.

"You've got the green room, Marmaduke," said Peggy. "The one with the
Chippendale furniture you used to covet so much."

"I haven't got much to change into," laughed Doggie, looking down at his
uniform.

"You'll find Peddle up there waiting for you."

When Doggie entered the green room, he found Peddle, who welcomed him
with tears of joy and a display of all the luxuries of the toilet and
adornment which Doggie had left behind at home. There were pots of
[v]pomade and face cream, and nail polish; bottles of hair-wash and
tooth-wash; half a dozen gleaming razors; the array of brushes and combs
and [