wrathfully. 'What bee have you got in your bonnet?'

'Let us see the bee, Polson, let us see the bee.'

'Why, sir,' said Polson, turning with outspread hands of appeal, 'it
comes to nothing. It happened a week or two ago that I found a hulking
fellow with a digger's beard and a red shirt--one of those chaps we've
seen lately back from Ballarat and Geelong--skulking about outside
the gate. I asked him what he wanted, and he was drunk and abusive,
and--well, I had to give him a hiding.'

'Yes,' said the General, 'you had to give him a hiding. Why?'

'I've told you, sir,' Polson stammered. 'The fellow was drunk, and--when
I ordered him away, he got so beastly cheeky that I had to go for him.'

'Before this happened,' said the General, somewhat drawling on the
words, 'you exchanged cards and confidences?' Polson stretched out
his hands again in appeal, and the General, looking at him with a
countenance impassive as the Sphinx, felt a pang of pity in his heart,
for the lad was a good lad, and the old warrior knew it, and he had
been near to loving him, this past half-dozen years. And the boy was not
merely pale with the suffering of his mind, but his very eyes had lost
their colour, as a man's eyes do when he has received a shot in battle.
The General knew that look, and had seen it in the eyes of dying
comrades. It touched him nearly, but he gave no sign. 'Why did the man
tell you his name, and that he came from Melbourne?'

'He said,' Polson returned, desperately, 'that he wanted to see Mr.
Jervase, and that he meant to see him. He said my father would wish
anybody in hell who tried to hide him. That's all, sir.'

'And you, Jervase,' said the General, 'never heard of this man?'

'Never in my life,' Jervase answered bluntly. 'The world's gone mad, I
fancy. Everybody's making a fuss about a thing that'll be forgotten in a
week's time. Why didn't you,' he continued, turning sternly upon Polson,
'why didn't you tell me about this?'

'A man can't make a shindy about it every time he has a turn-up with a
tramp,' Polson answered. 'I didn't think it worth while to talk about
it.'

'Polson,' said the General, 'I've known you since you were no higher
than my knee, and I've never had a shadow of a reason to doubt your
word. I don't want you to turn informer and I shan't ask you another
question. You had better leave your father and myself to talk this out
together.'

'No, sir,' said Polson, 'there's trouble in the house,