ere unselfish little houses, that only wanted to be useful and
afford shelter to the wanderer, or provide a refuge for old age. All
made use, on placards, of the cautious expression "Apartments"; while
some flung all reserve to the winds and said also they were "To let"
outright. The least satisfactory one of the lot was almost invisible
owing to its egotism, but distinguishable from afar because the
cross-board on a standard that had been placed in the garden-front
had fallen forward over the palings like Punch's gallows. It didn't
much matter, because the placard attached was dissolving off in the
rains, and hanging down so low that a goat was eating it with relish,
standing against the parapet of the garden-fence.

They reached the point at which Albion Villas had been thwarted by a
hedge, rich in unripe sloes and green abortive blackberries, in their
attempt to get across a stubble-field to the new town, and passed in
instalments through its turnstile, or kissing-gate. Neither spoke,
except that Fenwick said, "Look at the goat," until, after they had
turned on to the chalk pathway, nearly dry in the warm sun and wind,
he added a question:

"Did you ever taste a sloe?"

"Yes, once."

"That is what every one says if you ask him if he ever tasted a sloe.
Nobody ever does it again."

"But they make sloe-gin of them?"

"That, my dear Vereker, is what everybody always says next. Sally
told me they did, and she's right. They console themselves for the
taste of the sloe by an imaginary _liqueur_ like _maraschino_. But
that's because they never tasted sloe-gin."

Vereker thinks he may conclude that Fenwick is talking for talk's
sake, and humours him. He can get to the memory-subject later.

"A patient of mine," he says, "who's been living at Spezzia, was
telling me about a fruit that was very good there, _diosperi_ he
called them. They must be very unlike sloes by his description."

"And naturally sloes made you think of them. I wonder what they
are--_diosperi_--_diosperi_----" He repeated the word as though
trying to recall it. Dr. Conrad helped the identification.

"He said they are what the Japs call jelly-plums--great big fruit,
very juicy."

"I know. They're persimmons, or a sort of persimmons. We used to get
lots of them in California, and even up at the Klondyke...."

He stopped abruptly and remained silent. A sudden change in him was
too marked to escape notice, and there could be no doubt about the
c