"Fellow like that never gets edged," argued Waddles. "The skin stays just so full all the time. Can't get any fuller. Did you ever try to talk with his royal jaglets? Sociable as an oyster! I tried to get him opened up the other day. He's been in India and Africa and everywhere else, they tell me, and I thought he might want to gas about his experiences. War stuff. Nothing stirring. A frost. Kidded him about the Boers, and the way the embattled farmers hung it on perfidious Albion. Couldn't even get a rise out of him. All he did was stare at me with those fishy eyes of his and make motions with his Adam's apple! Ever notice the way he watches you when you're talking to him? It's enough to make a man nervous! A major, eh? If he was a major, I wonder what the shave-tail lieutenants were like! D.S.O.! They got the initials balled up when they hitched that title to him. It should have been D.O.S.!" "All right," said Gilman; "I'll bite. I'll be the Patsy. Why D.O.S.?" "Dismal Old Souse, of course!" cackled Waddles. "Fits him like a glove, eh?" It was then that I expressed my opinion, as previously quoted: "You can't tell much about an Englishman by looking at him." But Waddles only laughed. He usually laughs at his own witticisms. "D.O.S.," said he. "Impromptu, but good. I'll have to tell it to the boys!" II But for Cyril, I suppose the Major would have remained a chair warmer indefinitely. Cyril was the Major's nephew, doing a bit of globe trotting after getting out of college, and he dropped in out of a clear sky, taking the Major entirely by surprise. We heard later that all the Major said was, "Bless me, it's Cyril, isn't it?" Looking at the boy, you knew at once what the Major had been like at twenty-five or thereabouts; so it goes without saying that Cyril was no motion-picture type for beauty. He was tall and thin and gangling, his feet were always in his way, his clothes did not fit him and would not have fitted anything human, his cloth hats were really not hats at all but speckled poultices, and he was as British as the unicorn itself. He was almost painfully shy when among strangers, and blushed if any one spoke to him; but his coming seemed to cheer the Major tremendously. It hadn't occurred to me before, but I presume the D.O.S. had been lonely for his kind. Cyril was his kind--no question about that--and the pair of them held a love feast which lasted all of one afternoon. Waddles witnessed this touching family reunion and told us about it afterward, but it is likely he handled the truth in his usual nonchalant manner. Waddles would never spoil a good story for the sake of mere accuracy.