Eves sighed with resignation, and looked round for a seat. There was nothing available except a bench along the wall, littered with tools and odds and ends of machinery. Being also plentifully besmeared with black grease, it looked far from inviting, especially as Eves was wearing a new pair of slacks; but he cleared a space large enough to afford sitting room, and taking the outer sheets of a newspaper that lay handy, spread them on the board, seated himself thereon, and opened the inner sheet to kill time until Templeton should have finished his job. Tom Eves, whose cap bore the badge of a certain regiment of Light Infantry, was in the final stage of convalescence from wounds received in action before Amiens. While in hospital he had learnt that Templeton, taken a prisoner in the early days of the Germans’ spring offensive, was among the first batch of officers repatriated under the terms of the armistice, and on applying to Miss Templeton for her nephew’s address, was astonished and amused to hear that he was hard at work in a little Dorset town within easy reach. "Just like old Bob!" he said to himself. "Two months’ leave! And instead of playing the giddy goat, as any sensible fellow would do in his place, he feels he must make up for lost time and swot away at his old inventions. With a good balance at Cox’s, too. Aunt Caroline says she quite approves of his spending his money in preparation for his career—just the sort of thing she would say! Well, I’ll look him up, the old juggins, first leave I have!"