"Well;" and Mr. Barradine made his first gesture--just a wave of the right hand. "One can't have two kings at Brentford. And honestly I shall feel that you have given me a smack in the face, if--" "Oh, my dear sir!" Then they sent Dale out of the room. Really it seemed that they had forgotten his presence, or they might have banished him before. It was the Colonel who suddenly appeared to remember that he was still standing over there by the window. He waited in a large empty room, and the time passed slowly. It was the luncheon hour, and far and near he heard the footsteps of clerks going to and coming from the midday meal. Bigwigs no doubt would take their luncheon privately, in small groups, here and there, all over the building. He too was getting very hungry. An hour passed, an hour and a half, two hours; and then he was again summoned to the other room. There was no one in it except the secretary--looking hot and red after a copious repast, speaking jovially and familiarly, and seeming altogether more common and less important than when under the restraining influence of bigwigs. "Ah, here you are." And he chuckled amicably, and gave Dale a roguish nod. "You've had your wires pulled A1 for you. It's decided to stretch a point in your favor. Not to make a secret, they don't wish to run counter to Mr. B.'s wishes. You have been lucky, Mr. Dale, in having him behind you." Dale gulped, but did not say anything. "Very well. I am to inform you that you will be reinstated; but--in order to allow the talk to blow over--you will not resume your duties for a fortnight. You will take a fortnight's holiday--from now--on full pay." Dale said nothing. He could have said so much. At this moment he felt that his victory had been intrinsically a defeat. But the strength had gone from him; and in its place there was only joy--weak but immense joy in the knowledge that all had ended happily. And the world would say that he had won. V Outside in the streets his joy increased. Nothing had mattered. Beneath all surface sensations there was the deep fundamental rapture: as of a wild animal that has been caught, and is now loose and free--a squirrel that has escaped from the trap, and, whisking and bounding through sunlight and shadow, understands that its four paws are still under it, and that only a little of its fur is left in those iron teeth. Security after peril--articulate man or dumb brute, can one taste a fuller bliss? But he must share and impart it. Mavis! He might not go dashing back to Hampshire--the fortnight's exile prevented him from joining her there. A broad grin spread across his face. What was that learned saying that his old schoolmaster, Mr. Fenley, used to be so fond of repeating? "If Mahomet can not go to the mountain, the mountain must come to Mahomet." The memory of this classical quotation tickled him, and he went chuckling into the Cannon Street post office and wrote out a telegraph-form.