“You wouldn’t understand if I did tell you.”
The Major rapped smartly on the table. “Impudence will do you no good, my man! Answer the Sergeant’s question!”
“I decline to do so.”
Stonor said: “I have established the point I wished to make, sir. He can’t answer it.”
Major Egerton proceeded: “Well, why didn’t you wait for her until she got well?”
“I had to make a garden at home.”
“You travelled three hundred miles down the river and back again to make a garden!”
“We have to eat through the winter.”
“Stonor, was there a garden started at Imbrie’s place?”
“Yes, sir, but it had been started weeks before. The potatoes were already several inches high.”