A cut of the devastated joint, strong mustard pickles, a hunch of good bread, a pint of porter and the freedom of the cheese to follow, soon dispelled the dismalness of the room; an effect to which the attendant magician contributed more literally by his great trick of vanishing crumbs and disappearing plates, including his own half-eaten meal. How good it was, this cold roast beef of old England, how equally redolent of the dear old country those hunting pictures on the low wainscoted walls, with all their gay bravado. There were four of them: _The Meet_, _Breaking Cover_, _Full Cry_, _The Death_; all populous with spirited pink gentlemen and violently animated dogs and horses, culminating in the leading dog tearing the fox, and the leading gentleman waving his tall hat in rapture. He quaffed voluptuously at his frothing pewter pot. To the Queen of the May—ay, why not drink to _her_? “How’s Mr. Gander?” he asked irrelevantly, with a sudden image of the bull-necked landlord and his massive gold scarfpin. The waiter—on the point of disappearing—materialized himself again, and stared at the questioner. “He ain’t _any_how,” he gasped at last. “At least that’s a secret ’twixt him and his Maker.” “Dead?” It was Will’s turn to gasp. Could so much gross vitality be extinct, or even rarefied? “Dead and married over. She’s Mrs. Mott now, though the old customers will keep on with the Mother Gander, just as I have to bite my tongue not to call her husband Charley.” He lowered his voice. “He was the potboy once.” Will whistled. “What women are!” was in that knowing note. How pleasant it was thus to discuss—with beer and pickles!—life and death and the sex. “Yes, sir—the potboy, and busting with pride if I let him hand up the plates at the Bowling Club dinner.” A sigh accented the cruel change. “You’ve been away, sir, I presoom.” “Half round the world,” said Will with airy inaccuracy. “But why didn’t _you_ go in for her?” “Me! With my old woman! Besides _I_ wasn’t going to turn Peculiar—no, not for ten ‘Black Sheep.’ You’ve heard o’ Peculiars, sir?” “Ye-es.” A cayenne pod in the pickles made him cough. “Thick as blackberries about these parts—and as full of texts as the bush of prickles.” The waiter’s voice sank again. “She made poor Charley into one of ’em. He’s got to go to chapel three times every Sunday and once on Wednesday.” “Poor chap!” There was sympathy as well as mockery in Will’s tone. “But can you tell me”—he had a sudden remembrance—“why she runs down this place so? Is it her Peculiar conscience?”