g and
handed him to the girl. She received him tenderly.

"I'm very much obliged to you," he said. "Good day. I'll let myself
out. It--it'll be better."

One more caress, and he passed out into the hall--blindly. There had
been a look in the bright brown eyes that tore his heart.

For a moment Patch fought desperately. Then he heard a door opened and
listened intently. A draught swept, and the door closed heavily. With
a sudden wrench he was out of the girl's arms and across the shadowy
hall. For a moment he stood sniffing, his nose clapped to the sill of
the front door. Then he lifted up his voice and wept bitterly.

* * * * *

In the long mirror, half-way up the front staircase, Major Anthony
Lyveden, D.S.O., surveyed himself stealthily.

"Not much the matter with the kit," he said grudgingly.

That was largely because there was nothing the matter with the man.

Six feet one in his socks, deep-chested and admirably proportioned,
Lyveden cut a fine figure. His thick dark hair was short and carefully
brushed, and his lean face was brown with the play of wind and rain and
sun. Such features as his broad forehead, aquiline nose, and strong
well-shaped mouth, would have distinguished any countenance. Yet the
whole of it was shapely and clean-cut, and there was a quiet
fearlessness about the keen grey eyes that set you thinking. As a
footman he looked magnificent. But he would have killed any master
stone dead. Royalty itself could not have borne such a comparison.

As we have seen, the strain of the last fortnight, culminating in Blue
Moon's failure and his parting with Patch, had played the deuce with
his temperament. The man had gone all to pieces. That, now that a
week had gone by, he was himself again, the following letter will show.
It will serve also as a record, and so, gentlemen, spare both of us.

_DEAR TOBY,_

_Before you sailed you were urgent upon me that I should constantly
report progress. Nine months have gone by, and I have not written
once. Still, my conscience is clear. Hitherto I have had no progress
to report._

_Now, however, I have news for you._

_You are friends with a footman, Toby. You need not deny it, because I
know better. You see, I have been in service for one week to-day._

_My mistress is indescribable--a very mammoth among women. Except
during prohibited hours, her replica may be seen behind the saloon-bar
of any public-h