" he stared at the good old man as
though he were Vitellius in person. Tough? It was like milk-fatted
baby. He was already devouring, like Oliver, his second helping. Then
the Dean, pledging him and Oliver in champagne, apologized: "I'm
sorry, my dear boys, the 1904 has run out and there's no more to be
got. But the 1906, though not having the quality, is quite drinkable."

Drinkable! It was laughing, dancing joy that went down his throat.

So much for gross delights. There were others--finer. The charm to the
eye of the table with its exquisite napery and china and glass and
silver and flowers. The almost intoxicating atmosphere of peace and
gentle living. The full, loving welcome shining from the eyes of the
kind old Dean, his uncle by marriage, and of the faded, delicate lady,
his own flesh and blood, his mother's sister. And Peggy, pretty,
flushed, bright-eyed, radiant in her new dress. And there was
Oliver....

Most of all he appreciated Oliver's comrade-like attitude. It was a
recognition of him as a man and a soldier. In the course of dinner
talk Oliver said:

"J.M.T. and I have looked Death in the face many a time--and really
he's a poor raw-head and bloody-bones sort of Bogey; don't you think
so, old chap?"

"It all depends on whether you've got a funk-hole handy," he replied.

But that was mere lightness of speech. Oliver's inclusion of him in
his remark shook him to the depths of his sensitive nature. The man
who despises the petty feelings and frailties of mankind is doomed to
remain in awful ignorance of that which there is of beauty and pathos
in the lives of his fellow-creatures. After all, what did it matter
what Oliver thought of him? Who was Oliver? His cousin--accident of
birth--the black sheep of the family; now a major in a different
regiment and a different division. What was Oliver to him or he to
Oliver? He had "made good" in the eyes of one whose judgment had been
forged keen and absolute by heroic sorrows. What did anyone else
matter? But to Doggie the supreme joy of the evening was the knowledge
that he had made good in the eyes of Oliver. Oliver wore on his tunic
the white mauve and white ribbon of the Military Cross. Honour where
honour was due. But he, Doggie, had been wounded (no matter how) and
Oliver frankly put them both on the same plane of achievement, thus
wiping away, with generous hand, all hated memories of the past.

When the ladies had left the room, history repeated its