oving, on the ammunition column of his brigade.

I walked back to the R.F.A. mess, picked up a newspaper in the
ante-room, and dropped into a chair. My heart was beating like a
girl's at her first ball. "France"--"France"--the very "r" in that
glorious word kept beating in my ears with the roll of a side-drum.
I gripped the _Times_, steadied myself down to master the short
little paragraph on which my eyes had been fixed, unseeing, for a
couple of minutes, and found myself staring at this announcement:

"A marriage has been arranged, and will shortly take place,
between Peter Farrell, Esq., of 15a The Albany, and Constantia,
only daughter of the late George Wellesley Denistoun, Esq.,
J.P., D.L., of Framnel in the West Riding of Yorkshire, and of
Mrs. Denistoun of 105 Upper Brook Street, W."

NIGHT THE TWENTY-FOURTH.

CONSTANTIA.

The drumming in my ears died suddenly out to silence, and then
started afresh more violently than ever, and more sharply, for the
long pinging of an electric bell shrilled through it. The pinging
ceased sharply: the drumming continued; and I looked up to see the
mess sergeant standing over me, at attention.

"Telephone call for you, sir."

I went to the instrument like a man in a dream. Something suddenly
gone wrong with Sally's healthy first-born? Jimmy starting for
France and ringing me up for farewell? Farrell--damn Farrell!--to
talk business? Jephson, with word that he had achieved the urgent
desire of his heart and been passed as a gunner, to join me, _quo fas
et gloria ducunt_? These four only, to my knowledge, had my probable
address.

"Hallo?" I called.

"Hallo!" came the answer sharp and prompt, in a woman's voice which I
recognised at once for Constantia's. "Is that you, Roddy?"

"Yes--Roddy, all right," I spoke back, mastering my voice.

"Have you seen--?" Her voice trailed off.

"D'you mean the announcement? Yes, two minutes ago. Is it
congratulations you're ringing up in this hurry?"

"Roddy, dear, don't be a beast!" the voice implored. "I'm in a
horrible hole, and I think only you can help me. Is it possible for
you to get leave, and come? Mamma asks me to say that there's a room
here, and--and we want you!"

"As it happens," returned I, "there'll be no trouble about getting
leave. We're to start--report says--at the end of the week, and I
must be sent up to collect a few service odds-and-ends. As for
sleeping, I'll