lf. I don't see the result at all. I only see the
work, and with God's help, that will be exactly what He intended it
should be when He gave it to me to do."

"Lucky man!" said Everard briefly.

"Ah! I didn't think myself lucky when I had to give up the Charthurst
chaplaincy." Bernard spoke through a haze of smoke. "I'm afraid I kicked
a bit at first--which was a short-sighted thing to do, I admit. But I
had got to look on it as my life-work, and I loved it. It held such
opportunities." He broke off with a sharp sigh. "I shall be at it again
if I go on. Can't you give me something pleasanter to think about?
Haven't you got a photograph of your wife to show me?"

Everard got up. "Yes, I have. But it doesn't do her justice." He took a
letter-case from his pocket and opened it. A moment he stood bent over
the portrait he withdrew from it, then turned and handed it to his
brother.

Bernard studied it in silence. It was an unmounted amateur photograph of
Stella standing on the creeper-grown verandah of the Green Bungalow. She
was smiling, but her eyes were faintly sad, as though shadowed by the
memory of some past pain.

For many seconds Bernard gazed upon the pictured face. Finally he spoke.

"Your wife must be a very beautiful woman."

"Yes," said Everard quietly.

He spoke gravely. His brother's eyes travelled upwards swiftly. "That
was not what you married her for, eh?"

Everard stooped and took the portrait from him. "Well, no--not
entirely," he said.

Bernard smiled a little. "You haven't told me much about her, you know.
How long have you been acquainted?"

"Nearly two years. I think I mentioned in my letter that she was the
widow of a comrade?"

"Yes, I remember. But you were rather vague about it. What happened to
him? Didn't he meet with a violent death?"

There was a pause. Everard was still standing with his eyes fixed upon
the photograph. His face was stern.

"What was it?" questioned Bernard. "Didn't he fall over a precipice?"

"Yes," abruptly the younger man made answer. "It happened in Kashmir
when they were on their honeymoon."

"Ah! Poor girl! She must have suffered. What was his name? Was he a pal
of yours?"

"More or less." Everard's voice rang hard. "His name was Dacre."

"Oh, to be sure. The man I wrote to you about just before poor Madelina
Belleville died in prison. Her husband's name was Dacre. He was in the
Army too, and she thought he was in India. But it's not a very uncommo