“You don’t remember what happened to him after that?”
“Um—I think he went as young Andrews’ servant.”
“Ah! What did he come from?”
“Andrews? Gunner, he was!”
“Thanks. That may help. You saw the row when the Mayor of the village came to certify the damage?”
“Aye, there was some blethers about the business. You couldna’ wonder. The old feller was got up like a Tattie Bogle. The men had had no rest, and were going straight back to the line. They marched all right, but you couldn’t keep them from calling names at such a Guy—young troops like that!”
“You couldn’t describe Andrews’ servant to me?”
“No. He looked ordinary!”
A mistake, of course, no use to ask old Chirnside things like that. A third of a century in the army had long ago drilled out of him any sort of imagination he might ever have had. He was just doing a handsome thing by a brother officer in remembering at all. His instinct was obviously to know nothing about it. But, piqued by the novelty of Commissioned rank, he went on: “Yes, I can tell you something. That feller had a grievance. I remember something turning up in one of his letters, when we censored ’em. Lucky spot when you think how most of the censoring was done.”
“I should think so. What was it?”