very proud of our Wellingsford
Hospital. It is the largest and the wealthiest in the county. We owe it
to the uneasy conscience of a Wellingsford man, a railway speculator in
the forties, who, having robbed widows and orphans and, after trial at
the Old Bailey, having escaped penal servitude by the skin of his
teeth, died in the odour of sanctity, and the possessor of a colossal
fortune in the year eighteen sixty-three. This worthy gentleman built
the hospital and endowed it so generously that a wing of it has been
turned into a military hospital with forty beds. I have the honour to
serve on the Committee. Betty Fairfax entered as a Probationer early in
September, and has worked there night and day ever since. That is why
we chatted about the wounded. Having a day off, she had indulged in the
luxury of pretty clothes. Of these I had duly expressed my admiration.

Tea over, she lit a cigarette for me and one for herself and drew her
chair a trifle nearer the fire. After a little knitting of the brow,
she said:--

"You haven't asked me why I invited myself to tea."

"I thought," said I, "it was for my beaux yeux."

"Not this time. I rather wanted you to be the first to receive a
certain piece of information."

I glanced at her sharply. "You don't mean to say you're going to be
married at last?"

In some astonishment she retorted:--

"How did you guess?"

"Holy simplicity!" said I. "You told me so yourself."

She laughed. Suddenly, on reflection, her face changed.

"Why did you say 'at last'?"

"Well--" said I, with a significant gesture.

She made a defiant announcement:--

"I am going to marry Willie Connor."

It was my turn to be astonished. "Captain Connor?" I echoed.

"Yes. What have you to say against him?"

"Nothing, my dear, nothing."

And I hadn't. He was an exemplary young fellow, a Captain in a
Territorial regiment that had been in hard training in the
neighbourhood since August. He was of decent family and upbringing, a
barrister by profession, and a comely pink-faced boy with a fair
moustache. He brought a letter or two of introduction, was billeted on
Mrs. Fairfax, together with one of his subs, and was made welcome at
various houses. Living under the same roof as Betty, it was natural
that he should fall in love with her. But it was not at all natural
that she should fall in love with him. She was not one of the kind that
suffer fools gladly.... No; I had nothing against Willie Connor.