me," Dominey replied in spiritless fashion. "It will be better
than a music hall, at any rate. I am not at all sure, Seaman, that
the hardest part of my task over here will not be this necessity for
self-imposed amusements."

His companion struck the table gently but impatiently with his clenched
fist.

"Man, you are young!" he exclaimed. "You are like the rest of us. You
carry your life in your hands. Don't nourish past griefs. Cast the
memory of them away. There's nothing which narrows a man more than
morbidness. You have a past which may sometimes bring the ghosts
around you, but remember the sin was not wholly yours, and there is
an atonement which in measured fashion you may commence whenever you
please. I have said enough about that. Greatness and gaiety go hand in
hand. There! You see, I was a philosopher before I became a professor of
propaganda. Good! You smile. That is something gained, at any rate. Now
we will take a taxicab to Holborn and I will show you something really
humorous."

At the entrance to the town hall, the two men, at Seaman's instigation,
parted, making their way inside by different doors. Dominey found a
retired seat under a balcony, where he was unlikely to be recognised
from the platform. Seaman, on the other hand, took up a more prominent
position at the end of one of the front rows of benches. The meeting was
by no means overcrowded, over-enthusiastic, over-anything. There were
rows of empty benches, a good many young couples who seemed to have
come in for shelter from the inclement night, a few sturdy,
respectable-looking tradesmen who had come because it seemed to be the
respectable thing to do, a few genuinely interested, and here and
there, although they were decidedly in the minority, a sprinkling of
enthusiasts. On the platform was the Duke, with civic dignitaries on
either side of him; a distinguished soldier, a Member of Parliament, a
half-dozen or so of nondescript residents from the neighbourhood, and
Captain Bartram. The meeting was on the point of commencement as Dominey
settled down in his corner.

First of all the Duke rose, and in a few hackneyed but earnest sentences
introduced his young friend Captain Bartram. The latter, who sprang at
once into the middle of his subject, was nervous and more than a
little bitter. He explained that he had resigned his commission and
was therefore free to speak his mind. He spoke of enormous military
preparations in Germany and a gene