Kantara in 1917._

_"Lyveden," says he one day, "you're a gentleman, aren't you?"_

_It seemed easiest to say "Yes."_

_"Why?" says his lordship._

_"It's a family failing," said I._

_"How beastly! You mean, like drink?"_

_"Exactly, my lord. We never mention it."_

_"No, don't," says he. "My mother's very hot on that sort of thing.
Hullo!" He peers into a gold cigarette-case. "I had four pounds in
here. I'll swear I had."_

_Considering that I had found the case in the library, and had restored
it to him five minutes before, his ejaculation was not in the best of
taste. His lordship, however, must whet his point upon the grindstone
of insult._

_"You're not hard up, are you?" says he._

_"I can pay my way, my lord."_

_"Well, I know there was four pounds there, because---- No. Wait a
minute. It's all right. I remember I put it in my coat. Which
reminds me--I want a couple of stalls at Daly's. You might ring up and
get them. How much is the pit?"_

_"I'm not quite sure, my lord. It used to be half-a-crown."_

_"Half-a-crown!" cries he. "I thought it was a shilling."_

_"That's the gallery, my lord."_

_"Oh, yes. Well, I can't afford the pit, Lyveden, but you can go to
the gallery if you like," and he produces a shilling._

_I shake my head._

_"I'm much obliged to your lordship, but I seldom go out."_

_"Right-o," he says, with ill-concealed relief. "Don't forget those
stalls."_

_It is pathetic, Toby, but it is true. And when I was at Harrow, his
eldest brother, who is one of the best, was my fag._

_When I say that, compared with the butler, Respectability itself seems
raffish, you will understand. He is a monument, massive, meaningless,
and about as useful as a fan in a cyclone. Yet the household revolves
about him. He came in, I fancy, with the spittoon...._

_And now I will show you that the cassock of the confessor has indeed
fallen upon you._

_Listen. I have been disdained--given the cold shoulder. Such a
beautiful shoulder, Toby. Such a shoulder as Artemis presented to
Actaeon. But there was good reason for that. It fell on this wise. I
sat in a garden and mufti and looked at an aged doorway, thinking how
fair a frame it would make. And when next I looked, lo! there was the
picture, all warm and smiling, her little white hands about her dark,
dark hair. I was overwhelmed. I would have slain dragons, levelled
castles, broken the backs of knights for he