“That’s moonshine,” said I. And as regards the drinking, drabbing, and gaming of course it was.  But the suggestion of cowardice gave me a sharp stab of surprise and dismay.

“I know it is,” said Marigold.  “But the people hereabouts are so ignorant, you can make them believe anything.”  Marigold was a man of Kent and had a poor opinion of those born and bred in other counties.  “I met Gedge this morning,” he continued, and thereupon gave me the substance of the conversation.  I hardly think the adjectives of the report were those that were really used.

“So your precious Colonel has got the V.C.,” sneered Gedge.

“He has,” said Marigold.  “And it’s too great an honour for your inconsiderable town.”

“If this inconsiderable town knew as much about him as I do, it would give him the order of the precious boot.”

“And what do you know?” asked Marigold.

“That’s what all you downtrodden slaves of militarism would like to find out,” replied Gedge.  “The time will come when I, and such as I, will tear the veils away and expose them, and say ’These be thy gods, O Israel.’”

“The time will come,” retorted Marigold, “when if you don’t hold your precious jaw, I and such as I will smash it into a thousand pieces.  For twopence I’d knock your ugly head off this present minute.”

Whereupon Gedge apparently wilted before the indignant eye of Sergeant Marigold and faded away down the High Street.

All this in itself seemed very trivial, but for the past year the attitude of Gedge had been mysterious.  Could it be possible that Gedge thought himself the sole repository of the secret which Boyce had so desperately confided to me?  But when had the life of Gedge and the military life of Leonard Boyce crossed?  It was puzzling.

Well, to tell the truth, I thought no more about the matter.  The glow of Mrs. Boyce’s happiness remained with me all the evening.  Rarely had I seen her so animated, so forgetful of her own ailments.  She had taken the rosiest view of Leonard’s physical condition and sunned herself in the honour conferred on him by the King.  I had never spent a pleasanter afternoon at her house.  We had comfortably criticised our neighbours, and, laudatores temporis acti, had extolled the days of our youth.  I went to bed as well pleased with life as a man can be in this convulsion of the world.

The next morning she sent me a letter to read.  It was written at Boyce’s dictation.  It ran: 

“Dear Mother: 

“I’m sorry to say I am knocked out pro tem.  I was fooling about where a C.O. didn’t ought to, and a Bosch bullet got me so that I can’t write.  But don’t worry at all about me.  I’m too tough for anything the Bosches can do.  To show how little serious it is, they tell me that I’ll be conveyed to England in a day or two.  So get hot-water bottles and bath salts ready.

“Your ever loving Leonard.”