"He was a captain in the navy." Carstairs was rather surprised.
"That's alright. I suppose we can't expect anything better. Get those papers!" His last remark was addressed to the woman.
Carstairs stood silently wondering—mystified. He heard the woman unlocking something at the back of the caravan, then she came up and held out some parchment-looking papers. The old man took them in a feeble thin hand and laid them on the bed clothes in front of him.
"I am Sir Thomas D'Arcy," he said.
Carstairs was astonished beyond measure, but his countenance showed very little of it.
"Yes," the old man continued, slowly, "I am Sir Thomas D'Arcy, one time plain Thomas D'Arcy, Professor of Music at Oxford, profligate and drunkard. This gipsy woman is my legally married wife, and that girl is my daughter; there is no estate, and the money is all spent. You can marry the girl when you are getting £400 a year."
"Well, I'm damned." Carstairs thought it so fervently that for a moment he feared it must be visible on his face, but the old man was resting with closed eyes.
"Are you satisfied?" he asked, at length.
"Quite," Carstairs answered.
"What are you getting now?"