And the constable goes, taking care, however, to keep an eye
occasionally on the corner where this has taken place. He has not gone
long before Rolleston raises his head with a husky laugh: his manner has
changed now; he is no longer the boy in thought and expression that he
was a short time before, and speaks as might be expected from his
appearance.

'I remember it all now,' he says. 'You are Ethel Gordon, of course you
are, and you wouldn't have anything to do with me--and quite right
too--and then you married my brother Lionel. You see I'm as clear as a
bell again now. So you came up and found me battering at the old door,
eh? Do you know, I got the fancy I was a boy again and coming home
to--bah, what does all that matter? Odd sort of fancy though, wasn't it?
Drink is always playing me some cursed trick now. A pretty fool I must
have made of myself!'

She says nothing, and he thrusts his hands deep in his ragged pockets.
'Hallo! what's this I've got?' he says, as he feels something at the
bottom of one of them, and, bringing out the box of soldiers he had
bought half an hour before, he holds it up with a harsh laugh which has
the ring of despair in it.

'Do you see this?' he says to her. 'You'll laugh when I tell you it's a
toy I bought just now for--guess whom--for your dear husband! Must have
been pretty bad, mustn't I? Shall I give it to you to take to him--no?
Well, perhaps he has outgrown such things now, so here goes!' and he
pitches the box over the railings, and it falls with a shiver of broken
glass as the pieces of painted tin rattle out upon the flag-stones.

'And now I'll wish you good evening,' he says, sweeping off his battered
hat with mock courtesy.

She tries to keep him back. 'No, Wilfred, no; you must not go like that.
We live here still, Lionel and I, in the same old house,' and she
indicates the house next door; 'he will be home very soon. Will you'
(she cannot help a little shudder at the thought of such a guest)--'will
you come in and wait for him?'

'Throw myself into his arms, eh?' he says. 'How delighted he would be!
I'm just the sort of brother to be a credit to a highly respectable
young barrister like him. You really think he'd like it? No; it's all
right, Ethel; don't be alarmed: I was only joking. I shall never come in
your way, I promise you. I'm just going to take myself off.'

'Don't say that,' she says (in spite of herself she feels relieved);
'tell me--is there nothing