"Splendid," I answered, smiling in return. "Have you got him at the waggon line?" "No; I saw him as I was coming up here. He was trotting along with a captain who was going towards that village with the factory, over there." "Was he a staff captain, with a Military Cross and another ribbon?" I asked.... "Didn't you tell him it was our dog?" "That's so. I told him that, and 'Ernest' came and jumped around when he saw me; but the captain said it couldn't be our dog, because a brigadier-general's name was on the collar, and he wasn't going to let him go; his colonel wanted him. Besides," added the doctor plaintively, "'Ernest' wouldn't follow me." "His colonel!" I repeated, puzzled. "Didn't he say 'his General'? A staff captain is on a brigadier-general's staff.... His colonel?... Are you sure he was a staff captain? Was he wearing red?" "I didn't see any red," replied the doctor. "He was walking behind a waggon that had a pile of wood and iron on it. It looked as if they were moving." My face fell. "Did you notice his regiment? Was he a gunner or an infantryman, or what?" I asked quickly. "Well, I can't say that I did. I don't know all your regiments." The colonel joined us. "Laneridge has brought my mare up," he remarked pleasantly. "You'd like a little exercise, perhaps. When the doctor has finished his sick parade you take my mare and see if the dog can be found." The doctor and I rode across country, and scoured the village he had pointed to, but there was no trace of "Ernest." We spoke to a couple of military policemen, told them all about our loss, saw that they inscribed particulars in their note-books, and then continued our inquiries among some heavy gunners, who had pulled into a garden near the sugar factory. I even narrated the story to an Irish A.P.M., who was standing in the street conversing with a motoring staff officer. "I've been in this village fully an hour and haven't seen a dog such as you describe," said the A.P.M. "And I'm sure I should have noticed him.... I'm fond of dogs, and I notice them all.... I'll help you any way I can.... Give me full particulars, and I'll pass them round to my police." He listened while I tried to obtain further clues from the doctor as to the branch of the service to which the captain, seen that morning with "Ernest," belonged. The doctor, his cap tilted backwards, a long dark cigar protruding at an angle of 45 degrees from the corner of his mouth, did his best, but it was no good. "I'm sorry--I don't know your regiments well enough," he said at last. It was at this point that the doctor's groom--in the building trade before the war--entered into the conversation. He had heard everything that had been said since the quest began, but this was the first remark he had made. "The officer the medical officer spoke to this morning, sir, was in the ---- Pioneers," he said to me. "Why didn't you tell us that before?" asked the doctor impatiently.