"I am sure she will, sir," answered John quietly.
The old man slid his arm through his.
"You shall take me up to the library. We can smoke there, and make ourselves comfortable."
In the library that night John heard much of Colonel Treves's past history, much of the family history, of the man whose identity he was wearing, and the more he heard of Bernard Treves the more he realised what a complete and utter waster that young man was. Often of late he had thought of Treves in the nursing home, and wondered what were the conditions of his detention there. Dacent Smith was always reticent upon that point. The sinking of the Polidor through the agency of Treves had been a black and irredeemable crime. A time was bound to come when the young man must answer for that piece of black treachery against his country. Looking at the matter in the most charitable light, John regarded Treves, as evidently Dacent Smith regarded him, that is, as a feeble, will-less creature, whose reason had been unseated, at any rate temporarily, by the drugs which were a mania with him.
The fact that Manwitz and Cherriton had plied him with these drugs showed only the bold unscrupulousness of the German methods. The German Intelligence Department had used Bernard Treves, and had moulded him to its purpose as though he had been of wax. And had not Dacent Smith brilliantly substituted John for Treves, untold disasters would have ensued.
"Bernard!" The Colonel's voice startled John out of his thought. "Bernard, I have seen Gosport lately."
John wondered who Gosport might be.
"Yes," went on the Colonel. "I was hasty with you, but I have made everything right. I have made up my mind to leave everything to you after all. What do you say to that?"
"It is very generous of you, sir," John answered. He knew that it was utterly impossible that a penny of the Colonel's possessions should ever be his.
"No, no, it is only right," responded the Colonel. "You have married well. You have rehabilitated yourself in every way, and I find you more what a Treves should be every time we meet." He suddenly gripped John's hand in his. "You have given me great happiness, Bernard, and one of the reasons I made haste to change my will is that the doctor has given me rather a bad report of myself. I don't think you'll have to put up with me for very long, Bernard!"