“Thank’ee kindly, but I’d rather smoke my pipe.”
The colonel smiled, and said:
“Oh, all right. Smoke away.”
He lighted up, and the fumes of the shag permeated the room. Some one opened another window, and the young officer who had addressed him at first suddenly looked at him and exclaimed:
“Innocent, by God! You couldn’t get shag like that anywhere but in Norfolk.”
It must have been over an hour later when another officer entered, and saluted.
“Message from G. H. Q., sir,” he said.
“Well?”
“They have arrested the gardener at the convent of St. Eloise, and they have every reason to believe that he is the notorious Paul Jouperts.”