w this
fine place. He remarked on the change when his mother came to his room
at bedtime, to give him his good-night kiss as she had been wont to do
in the days of old.

"Father wanted to make the place a bit more presentable now we have an
officer son," the good dame explained, with simple and pardonable
pride. "And we can afford it," she added, blushing like a shy
schoolgirl as she made this whispered confession; "besides we had Mary
to consider, too." It was all very charming, George thought.

The winter passed all too quickly. Mr. Allan proved to be a capital
neighbour, and had a great liking for young people about him. So there
were pleasant times, at the Towers--dinners, balls, shooting and
hunting parties, and the like. All the eligible society of the
country-side found its way to Binfield Towers. Yet somehow George
Fairburn did not fall into a fit of the blues when Sir Mark Fieldsend
took his sister back to their west-country home; in fact, strange to
say, George rather rejoiced to see the back of the retired major, his
old comrade-in-arms. Why this was so he would have found it hard to
explain, for a more unassuming and agreeable fellow than the baronet
it would not have been easy to find.

It was a real delight to everybody to hear how the Blackett pit was
now prospering. Under Fairburn's management the colliery had made a
clear profit of five thousand odd pounds in the course of a single
year's working. It was astounding. "Mary and you will be rich folks
again, my dears," the good Mrs. Fairburn remarked, in her own homely
but kindly way, to the brother and sister, and Matthew felt a lump in
his throat.

The wrench to George, when the time came for him and Matthew to return
to the Continent, seemed somehow vastly greater than it had been on
the two former occasions. However, once across the sea, he cast all
else than his profession to the winds. He did not know it, of course,
but the campaign that was coming was to prove to the Allies the most
costly they had yet experienced. The negotiations for a peace had
ended in nothing, and here was Marshal Villars, the only great French
leader as yet unbeaten by Marlborough, ready with a force of no fewer
than 110,000 men. True, many of his soldiers were raw recruits while
those of his opponent were mostly seasoned veterans. True also, France
was so crippled for money and munitions of war that it was rarely
possible to give every man of the army a full breakfast. Y