Then they would sit up over a last whisky-and-soda, discussing the play of this hand or that; till Stark produced his pet theory: “Say what you like, P.J., no man ever knows another till he’s drunk port and played poker with him.” § 4 Good days! but they came to an end: and once again the Brigade marched out, polished to the last bandolier-buckle, for Neuve Eglise. “A mighty good place,” assured the Canadians—serious-minded men—from whom they “took over.” And so indeed, with one or two exceptions, they found it. Batteries barked from a pleasant valley, under real trees: a valley down which a man might ride in safety. Peasants still lived, close to the firing line, in unshelled farms; crops were reaped within two miles of the trenches. Headquarters, instead of rat-infested cellars, found an unholed house—fields in rear, farm in front, Belgian landlady in the kitchen—at the foot of the village, below the skeleton of the Church. But here, as everywhere along the front, danger lurked. Men, grown careless by long immunity, had neglected to fortify their habitations. During their first week, the Southdown Infantry paid—for this neglect—the price of one hundred men, killed in their rest-billets behind the firing line. Still, compared with Ypres only a few miles away to northward, the place was—for gunners at any rate—paradise. . . . They had been at Neuve Eglise a week, were just getting comfortable, when Miss Macpherson’s telegram arrived. The dispatch rider brought it, shortly before tea; and Peter, busy signing the correspondence for Artillery Headquarters in the bare back-room where Corporal Pitman and Driver Norris had established themselves, let the thing lie for a good five minutes before he opened it. Then he tore the envelope; read: “Simpson died yesterday can you get leave macpherson.” He stood there, flimsy paper in his hands: no longer Lieutenant and Adjutant P. Jameson R.F.A., but Peter Jameson cigar merchant, of P. Jameson & Co., Lime Street, London. For a moment, he felt sorrow, the words “poor old Tom” framed themselves at his lips; till the brain, putting sorrow aside, insisted on business. “Tom Simpson being dead”—reasoned the brain—“meant that Tom Simpson’s widow would have to be paid out in cash.” “In cash!” the brain repeated. What a fool he had been to renew that partnership agreement. But then, who would have imagined that of two partners, one on active service, the other at home, the civilian should die first. A fantastic trick—fantastic. . . . Peter stalked out of the office, through the backyard, into the fields beyond. “Wonder what’s upset ’im,” commented Driver Norris, looking up from his typewriter. “He’s certainly worried,” admitted Corporal Pitman; and bent once more over his interminable “Army Forms.”