And so, for better or worse, Kattie Rimmer came into the story. CHAPTER XIII MOUNTING For the polishing of gems the dust of gems is necessary. And for the training of boys other boys are essential. Eager cast about for other boys against whom his colts might wear off some of their angles. Some men have a wonderful power of attracting and drawing out all that is best in their fellows. Personal magnetism, we call it, and it is a mighty gift of the gods. Charles Eager had that gift in a very remarkable degree, and with it many others that appealed to the most difficult of all sections of the community. Boys hate being made good. The man who can lift them to higher planes without any unpleasant consciousness thereof on their part is a genius, and more than a genius. We have, some of us, met such in our lives, and we think of them with most affectionate reverence and crown them with glory and honour, though, all too often, the world passes them by with but scant acknowledgment. But diamond-dust alone will polish diamonds. Softer stuff is useless, and the supply of boy-diamond-dust in that neighbourhood was small. So he laid masterful hands on what there was. Just outside Wyvveloe, between that and Wynsloe, lay Knoyle, the residence of Sir George Herapath, the great army contractor. He was a man of sixty-five, tall, gray-bearded, genial, enjoying a well-earned rest from a life of many activities. He had married late, and had one son, George, aged fifteen, and one daughter, Margaret, a year younger. His wife was dead. The firm of Herapath & Handyside, and its trade-mark of interlocked H.'s, was as well known in army circles as the War Department's own private mark. During the Napoleonic wars its business dealings were on a gigantic scale. It fed and clothed and sheltered armies in many lands, and carried out its every undertaking to the letter, cost what it might. The first consideration with the firm of H. and H. was perfect fulfilment of its obligations. None knew better how much depended on its exertions--how helpless the most skilful commander was unless he could count absolutely on his supplies. H. and H. never failed in their duty, and the firm reaped its reward, both in honours and in cash. But to both Herapath and his partner Handyside the honour they cherished most of all was the fact that their name and mark stood everywhere as a guarantee of reliability and fair dealing. Handyside died five years after his partner's baronetcy, and left the bulk of his money to Herapath, having no near relatives of his own. And Sir George, desirous of rest before he grew past the enjoyment of it, took into partnership his right-hand man, Ralph Harben, who had grown up with the firm, strung another H on to the bar of the first big one, which represented himself--so that the mark of the firm came to look something like a badly made hurdle--and left the direction of affairs chiefly in his hands.