"Because, my Jocko, she's a peasant Madonna. You couldn't stand up against her. No man could." "A powerful great creature from what I could see of her," the Colonel admitted. "A bit of a handful for Master Ernie, I should guess." Mrs. Lewknor's fine face became firm. She thought she scented a challenge in the words and dropped her eyes to her work to hide the flash in them. "Ernie'll hold her," she said. "He could hold any woman. He's a gentleman like his father before him." He reached a long arm across to her as he sat and raised her fingers to his lips. Years ago a bird had flashed across the vision of his wife, coming and going, in and out of the darkness, like the sparrow of the Saxon tale; but this had been no sparrow, rather a bird of Paradise. The Colonel knew that; and he knew that the fowler who had loosed the jewel-like bird was that baggy old gentleman who lived across the golf links in the little house that overlooked the Rectory. He knew and understood: for years ago the same bird had flashed with radiant wings across the chamber of his life too, swiftly coming, swiftly going. CHAPTER VI THE COLONEL LEARNS A SECRET If the Colonel in his missionary efforts for the National Service League made little impression on the masses in the East-end, he was astonishingly successful with such labour as existed in Old Town; which in political consciousness lagged fifty years behind its tumultuous neighbour on the edge of the Levels, and retained far into this century much of the atmosphere of a country village. There the Church was still a power politically, and the workers disorganised. The Brewery in the Moot and the Southdown Transport Company were the sole employers of labour in the bulk; and Mr. Pigott the only stubborn opponent of the programme of the League. Archdeacon Willcocks backed the Colonel with whole-hearted ferocity, and lent him the services of the Reverend Spink, who, flattered at working with a Colonel D.S.O., showed himself keen and capable, and proposed to run the Old Town branch of the League in conjunction with the Church of England's Men's Society. "I've got a first-rate secretary as a start," he told the Colonel importantly. "Who's that?" "Caspar." "Ernest Caspar!" cried the Colonel. "The old Hammer-man!" "No, his brother. Twice the man. Alfred--Mr. Trupp's chauffeur." A few days later, when leaving the curate's lodgings, the Colonel ran up against Ernie in Church Street. "Your brother's joined us," he said. "Are you going to?" Ernie's charming face became sullen at once. "I would, sir," he said. "Only for that." "Only for what?" "Alf." "You won't join because your brother has!" grinned the Colonel. Ernie rolled a sheepish head. "It's my wife, sir," he muttered. "See, he persecutes her somethink shameful."