ned to have on his chest
at the time.

"You see," said Daintree, "his leg was pretty stiff and he couldn't
get about much, even if he'd wanted to. There was nothing for him to do
except sit in a deck-chair. My wife felt it her duty to talk to him a
good deal."

Daintree seemed to be making excuses for Mrs. Daintree and Simcox. They
were unnecessary. Mrs. Daintree would have got his story out of him if
she thought he was really in need of sympathy, whether he sat in a chair
all day or was able to row races in the lake in the gardener's punt.

"Anyhow," said Daintree, "what he told her--he told it to me afterwards,
so there's no secret about it--was this: He got hit in the leg during an
advance through one of those woods north of the Somme, Mametz, I think.
It was a beastly place. Our fellows had been in there two days before
and had to clear out again. Then Simcox's lot went in--you know the sort
of thing it was?"

I nodded.

"Shell holes, and splintered tree trunks," I said. "Machine-guns
enfilading you, and H.E. bursting promiscuous. I know."

"Well, Sirmcox' fellows went in all right, and stayed there for a while.
Simcox says he remembers noticing that the ground was strewed with
debris left by the Germans when they cleared out, and by our fellows
afterwards. Equipment, rifles and all the rest of it lying about, as
well as other things--pretty ghastly things."

"You needn't go into details," I said. "I can guess."

"I'm only telling you this," said Daintree, "because all the stuff lying
about seems to have interested Simcox. It's odd the feelings men have at
these times. Simcox says the thing he chiefly wanted to do was to tidy
up. He had a kind of strong desire to pick things up and put them
away somewhere. Of course he couldn't; but he did pick up one thing,
a cigarette case. He showed it to me. It was one of those long-shaped,
flat white metal cases which fellows carry because they hold about
thirty cigarettes. Simcox says he doesn't know why he picked it up. He
didn't want it in the least. He just saw it lying there on the ground
and stuffed it into his pocket Almost immediately after that he was hit.
Bit of shrapnel under the knee."

"I remember hearing about that business," I said. "We were driven out
again, weren't we?"

"Exactly. And Simcox was left behind. He couldn't walk, of course. But
he crawled into a shell hole, and there he lay. Well, for the next two
days that wood wasn't healthy for eith