ge of women. They seemed
incalculable. It seemed impossible to chart the course of any of them
for any length of time. He winced as he wondered what Ada would say if
she knew what he was up to. He had no need to wonder. He knew perfectly
well that she would forgive and sympathize and let it be forgotten. That
was the way with English girls. He realized with a great uplifting of
the heart that this was part of the Englishman's goodly heritage. He
thought of himself, coming home at last to Ada, and how she would stroke
his hair and murmur "silly old boy," and he would be at peace. Peace! In
the meanwhile there was the war. It did not look so very good for the
time being. The Germans seemed an uncommonly tough proposition. Mr.
Spokesly wondered why all those military men, who wrote testimonials for
the London School of Mnemonics, couldn't show their amazingly improved
mentality by giving the enemy a licking. All very well to write, "Six
months ago I was a sergeant: now I am a major-general, and I consider it
is entirely due to your System." After all, what we needed was somebody
who could keep the Fritzies away from the Channel ports. He sighed. He
would have to dry his feet and go up on the bridge. As he stood up to
open a drawer to find a fresh pair of socks he slipped the ring into his
trousers pocket and forgot it.

As he went out into the alleyway to go forward, the last faint streaks
of light were vanishing from the sullen sky over the mountains of
Thessaly and a heavy blanket of clouds had come up from the eastward, so
that the night was ideally dark for running through these perilous
waters. Ahead of the _Tanganyika_ could be seen a faint light, carefully
screened so that only an observer high up and astern of her could see it
at all. This was the pilot light on the sloop, and Captain Meredith
mentioned in a low voice the necessity of keeping it in view, as
otherwise they might run each other down, it was so dark. There were two
other transports behind, one on each quarter, who would also need
watching. They had just received a general wireless call that a
submarine-course had been observed N. by N.-N.-E. from Skyros, which
would bring her into their zone about one in the morning. Escort would
signal change of course by a red light shown in three periods of two
seconds each. And, the captain added, he himself would be lying on his
settee just inside the door.

He vanished in the intense darkness and Mr. Spokesly f