st him, to all intents and purposes, two years after the
marriage, but blinding her eyes and stuffing her ears, had held high
her beautiful head and high her honour, filling her empty heart with
the love of her son and the esteem of her legion of real friends;
showing the bravest of beautiful faces to the world, until a happy
widowhood had set her free.

Some years of absolute happiness of the simplest kind had followed; the
marriage of her son and birth of her grandson, who had cost his mother
her life. Then the following year had come the Boer War, and the
heroic tragedy of Spion Kop, which left her childless; after that, many
years of utter devotion, to her grandson, who adored her; then the
Great War and the Battle of the Falkland Islands, which left her
absolutely bereft, with the care of the boy's greatest treasure, even
the grey parrot, Quarter-Deck, Dekko for short.

Methuselah of birds, it was possessed of an uncanny gift of human
speech and understanding, and had been promoted through generation to
generation, from sailing-vessel _via_ Merchant Service to British Navy.

As time and tragedy worked hard together to silver her hair and line
her face, so did a veritable imp of mischief, bred of her desolation,
seem to possess the old darling. She cared not a brass farthing for
the opinion of her neighbours, so that after the death of the great
Queen, who had been her staunchest friend, she had instructed Maria
Hobson, her maid and also staunchest friend, to revive the faded roses
of her cheeks with the aid of cosmetics. Things had gone from bad to
worse in that respect, until her pretty snow-white hair had been
covered by a flagrant golden perruque and the dear old face with a mask
of pink and white enamel. Her eyes were blue, and keen as a hawk's,
undimmed by the tears shed in secret during her tumultuous and tragic
life; her teeth, each one in a perfect and pearly state of
preservation, were her own, for which asset she was never given the
benefit of the doubt; her tongue was vitriolic; her heart of pure gold,
and she owned a right hand which said nothing to the left of the spaces
between its fingers through which, daily ran deeds of kindness and
streams of love towards the unfortunate ones of the earth.

Her dress was invariably of grey taffeta or brocade, bunched at the
back and trailing on the ground; there were ruffles, of priceless lace
at the elbow-sleeves and V-shaped neck; a plain straw poke-bonne