“What about?”

“This recruiting, sir.  Of course, you are aware he’s decided on it.”

“I’m not aware of anything of the sort,” said G.J. rather roughly, perhaps to hide his sudden emotion, perhaps to express his irritation at Mrs. Braiding’s strange habit of pretending that the most startling pieces of news were matters of common knowledge.

“Well, sir, of course you were out most of yesterday, and you dined at the club.  Braiding attended at a recruiting office yesterday, sir.  He stood three hours in the crowd outside because there was no room inside, and then he stood over two hours in a passage inside before his turn came, and nothing to eat all day, or drink either.  And when his turn came and they asked him his age, he said ‘thirty-six,’ and the person was very angry and said he hadn’t any time to waste, and Braiding had better go outside again and consider whether he hadn’t made a mistake about his age.  So Braiding went outside and considered that his age was only thirty-three after all, but he couldn’t get in again, not by any means, so he just came back here and I gave him a good tea, and he needed it, sir.”

“But he saw me last night, and he never said anything!”

“Yes, sir,” Mrs. Braiding admitted with pain.  “I asked him if he had told you, and he said he hadn’t and that I must.”

“Where is he now?”

“He went off early, sir, so as to get a good place.  I shouldn’t be a bit surprised if he’s in the army by this time.  I know it’s not the right way of going about things, and Braiding’s only excuse is it’s for the Empire.  When it’s a question of the Empire, sir....”  At that instant the white man’s burden was Mrs. Braiding’s, and the glance of her serious face showed what the crushing strain of it was.

“I think he might have told me.”

“Well, sir.  I’m very sorry.  Very sorry....  But you know what Braiding is.”

G.J. felt that that was just what he did not know, or at any rate had not hitherto known.  He was hurt by Braiding’s conduct.  He had always treated Braiding as a friend.  They had daily discussed the progress of the war.  On the previous night Braiding, in all the customary sedateness of black coat and faintly striped trousers, had behaved just as usual!  It was astounding.  G.J. began to incline towards the views of certain of his friends about the utter incomprehensibility of the servile classes—­views which he had often annoyed them by traversing.  Yes; it was astounding.  All this martial imperialism seething in the depths of Braiding, and G.J. never suspecting the ferment!  Exceedingly difficult to conceive Braiding as a soldier!  He was the Albany valet, and Albany valets were Albany valets and naught else.

Mrs. Braiding continued: 

“It’s very inconsiderate to you, sir.  That’s a point that is appreciated by both Braiding and I. But let us fervently hope it won’t be for long, sir.  The consensus of opinion seems to be we shall be in Berlin in the spring.  And in the meantime, I think”—­she smiled an appeal—­“I can manage for you by myself, if you’ll be so good as to let me.”