"I thought perhaps you weren't. If it isn't a rude question — snub me, if it is — why are you now?"
"Partly because of the war, and partly because I've always had rather a liking for criminology."
"How ghoulish!" remarked Miss Fawcett. "What were you going to be?"
"A barrister. I was reading for the Bar up at Oxford when the war broke out."
"Couldn't you have gone on with it afterwards?"
"Not very well. My father died the year the war ended, and there wasn't any too much money. So I thought I'd better be self-supporting as soon as I could."
"Mouldy for you," said Miss Fawcett with real sympathy.
"Oh no!" said Harding cheerfully. "I didn't mind."
"Well, I suppose it's fairly interesting work in a way, and you'll end up by being the head of Scotland Yard or something."
"I can't imagine anything more improbable. In any case I'm thinking of retiring and rearing chickens or pigs instead."