All at once she saw him in the darkness outside. He was not in uniform, but in grey flannel shorts and a white shirt open at the neck,--the clothes of his childhood. He trailed himself haltingly, as if his feet hurt him. ‘Sh!’ said Julian in her ear. ‘He’s disguised himself.’ ‘Ah, then he won’t get killed....’ ‘No.’ She caught sight of his face. It was a terrible disguise,--the shrivelled, yellow mask of an ancient cretin. He looked at her vacantly, and she thought with a pang: ‘Ah! I must pretend I don’t know him.’ He passed out of sight with his queer clothes and his limp and his changed face,--all the careful paraphernalia of his travesty. Looking at him, she was seized with sudden horror. There was something wrong: they would see through it. She tried to reach him, to warn him; but she was voiceless and he had disappeared. * * * * * It was Charlie himself, so the old gardener said, who wrote to tell him that he and Mariella were to be married. Master Charles had always been the beloved one,--the one to be ready with a smile and a pleasant word, and never a bit of haughtiness for all his Grannie made such a little prince of him. ‘And when this old war’s over, Lacey,’ he says, ‘we’ll be coming back to live in the dear old house. Grannie wants us to,’ he says, ‘and you may be sure we want to. We were never ones to like London. So look out for us before long.’ But ah! he had to come through the fighting first. They were to get married at once, for he was off to the front. Speaking for himself, said the old gardener, he’d have had enough of life if anything happened to Master Charlie. The next day, the announcement of their marriage at a registry office appeared in the “Times.” ‘Why, they can’t be more than nineteen,’ said Mamma, ‘and first cousins, too. A dreadful mistake. However, I suppose the chances are----’ and she sighed, settling her V.A.D. cap before the mirror. ‘I must write to the old lady. They were good-looking children--one of them especially. Why don’t you send a nice little note to the girl, Judith? You used to play together such a lot.’ ‘Oh, she wouldn’t remember me,’ said Judith, and went quickly away, sick with shock. Married, those two. Mariella a wife: Mrs. Charles Fyfe. ‘I am _young_ Mrs. Fyfe. This is Charlie, my husband.’ How had it happened?