but when I
heard you were coming to Wanhope the opportunity was too good to
be missed. Railway fares," Val added with a preoccupied smile,
"are a consideration to me. So don't walk away yet, Hyde,
please. I have such a vivid recollection of the last time we met.
Between the lines at dawn. Do you remember?"

"Everything, Val."

"You were badly hurt, but before you fainted you dragged a
promise out of me."

"Dragged it out of you?" Lawrence repeated: "that's one way of
putting it!"

"But I made some feeble resistance at the time," said Val mildly.
"My head wasn't clear then or for a long while after, but I had
a--a presentiment that it was a mistake. You meant it kindly."
Had he? Lawrence laughed. He had never been able, to analyse
the complex of instincts and passions that had determined his
dealings with Stafford on that dim day between the lines.

"You were in a damned funk weren't you, Val?"

Stafford gave a slight start, the reaction of the prisoner under
a blow. But apart from the coarse cynicism of it, which
irritated him, it was no more than he had foreseen, and from then
on till the end he did not flinch.

"Yes, anything you like: you can't overstate it. But my point is
that I gave you my parole. Will you release me from it?"

"Good God!" said Lawrence.

He had never been more surprised in his life. "Come in: let us
talk this over in the light."

CHAPTER VII

Through the open windows of the drawingroom, where candlesticks
of twisted silver glimmered among Laura's old, silvery brocades,
and dim mirrors, and branches of pink and white rosebuds blooming
deliciously in rose-coloured Dubarry jars, the two men came in
together, Lawrence keenly on the watch. But observation was
wasted on Stafford who had nothing to conceal, who was merely
what he appeared to be, a faded and tired-looking man of middle
height, with blue eyes and brown hair turning grey, and wellworn
evening clothes a trifle rubbed at the cuffs. It was difficult to
connect this gentle and unassuming person with the fiery memory
of the war, and Lawrence without apology took hold of Stafford's
arm like a surgeon and tried to flex the rigid elbow-muscles, and
to distinguish with his fingers used to handling wounds the hard
seams and hollows below its shrunken joint. The action, which
was overbearing was by no means redeemed by the intention, which
was brutal.

"Surely after all these years you don't propose to confess, V