as flickering uncertainly as Polson
and the General walked towards the foot of the staircase, leaving the
passage in darkness for a second or two at a time, and then flaring up
with an unwonted brilliance. The young man took a bedroom candle from a
table at the stairfoot, lit it, and motioned the General to precede
him. He, altogether military in gait, with his shoulders squared to the
utmost, marched upstairs as if he were heading an assault by escalade.
Polson followed, drooping.

'This is your room, sir,' the young man said when they came to the end
of the corridor on which they had entered. He threw open the door, and
revealed a cheerful scene. Tall wax candles flamed here and there, a
great fire burned with a steady glow on the hearth, and the rich dark
maroon curtains and hangings of the room gave it a secluded, sheltered,
and homely look which under other circumstances would have been wholly
comfortable by contrast with the elemental war outside. The General
walked into the apartment bolt upright, and Polson stood with the door
handle in his grasp, waiting to catch his eye for a single instant that
he might say good-night. The elder man wheeled suddenly.

'Come in!' he said. 'Come in and close the door.' Polson obeyed,
wondering what was about to happen. 'I suspect,' Boswell began, 'that I
shall have cause to be sorry for myself and for somebody much dearer to
me than myself before this business is over. But I am sorry for you,
in the meantime, my lad, and I want to tell you that you will have to
revise your ideas a little.'

'As to what, sir?' asked Polson.

'Unless I am very much mistaken,' the elder went on, 'the business which
has been sprung upon us to-night will take some time to settle, and will
make more noise in the world than either you or I will care to hear. You
can't go into the army with this hanging over you.'

'I had made up my mind about that already,' said the youngster.

'Well,' the General returned, 'it's a bitter pill for you to swallow,
and, as I have said, I am sorry for you. It will not be easy for you to
be on terms of intimate friendship with a man who is compelled to fight
your father tooth and nail, and there is nothing else for it at this
moment but for you and me to say good-bye. Things may right themselves,
but I see no use in mincing matters, and I tell you the honest truth
when I say that I don't believe it, and that for the moment I don't even
hope for it. There are some me