out about, are there?" he replied. "Of
course you know Stenson?"

"I have been gazing at him with dilated eyes," she confided. "Is that
not the proper thing to do? He seems to me very ordinary and very
hungry."

"Well, then, there is the Bishop."

"I knew him at once from his photographs. He must spend the whole of the
time when he isn't in church visiting the photographer. However, I like
him. He is talking to my aunt quite amiably. Nothing does aunt so much
good as to sit next a bishop."

"The Shervintons you know all about, don't you?" he went on. "The
soldiers are just young men from the Norwich barracks, Doctor Lennard
was my father's tutor at Oxford, and Mr. Hannaway Wells is our latest
Cabinet Minister."

"He still has the novice's smirk," she remarked. "A moment ago I heard
him tell his neighbour that he preferred not to discuss the war. He
probably thinks that there is a spy under the table."

"Well, there we are--such as we are," Julian concluded. "There is no one
left except me."

"Then tell me all about yourself," she suggested. "Really, when I come
to think of it, considering the length of our conversations, you have
been remarkably reticent. You are the youngest of the family, are you
not? How many brothers are there?"

"There were four," he told her. "Henry was killed at Ypres last year.
Guy is out there still. Richard is a Brigadier."

"And you?"

"I am a barrister by profession, but I went out with the first Inns of
Court lot for a little amateur soldiering and lost part of my foot at
Mons. Since then I have been indulging in the unremunerative and highly
monotonous occupation of censoring."

"Monotonous indeed, I should imagine," she agreed. "You spend your time
reading other people's letters, do you not, just to be sure that there
are no communications from the enemy?"

"Precisely," he assented. "We discover ciphers and all sorts of things."

"What brainy people you must be!"

"We are, most of us."

"Do you do anything else?"

"Well, I've given up censoring for the present," he confided. "I am
going back to my profession."

"As a barrister?"

"Just so. I might add that I do a little hack journalism."

"How modest!" she murmured. "I suppose you write the leading articles
for the Times!"

"For a very young lady," Julian observed impressively, "you have
marvellous insight. How did you guess my secret?"

"I am better at guessing secrets than you are," she retorted a little
in