'No,--no, nothing. Strange, isn't it? Ever since that day when I found myself a good many miles away from Bombay, and realized that I was alive, everything stands out plainly in my memory; but before that,--nothing. I could describe to you in detail almost everything that has taken place since then. But there seems to be a great, black wall which hides everything that took place before. I shudder at it sometimes because it looks so impenetrable. Now and then I have dreams, the same old dreams of black, evil faces, and flashing knives, and cries of agony; but they are only dreams,--I remember nothing.' 'During the time you were in England training,' I said, 'you went to various parts of the country?' 'Yes, I was in Exeter, Swindon, Bramshott, Salisbury Plain.' 'And you recognized none of them, you'd no feeling that you had seen those places before?' 'No.' 'Faces, now,' I urged; 'do you ever see faces which suggest people you have known in the past?' He was silent for two or three seconds. 'Yes, and no,' he replied. 'I see faces sometimes which, while they don't cause me to remember, give me strange fancies and incomprehensible longings. Sometimes I hear names which have the same effect upon me.' 'And your memory has been good for ordinary things?' He laughed gaily. 'I think that whatever I went through has increased my powers of memory,--that is, those things that took place since I woke up. If you will ask the sub., or the drill sergeant who gave me my training, they will tell you that there was never any need to tell me anything twice. I forget nothing, I never have to make an effort to remember. When I hear a thing, or see a man's face, I never forget it. I worked hard, too. I have read a good deal. I found that I knew nothing of mathematics, and that my knowledge of German and French was very hazy. It is not so now. Things like _that_ have come to me in a miraculous way.' 'Have you tried for a commission?' 'No. I have been offered one, but I wouldn't have it. Something, I don't know what, told me not to. I wouldn't even have a corporal's stripe.' 'And you have no more idea of who you really are than you had when I saw you first?' 'No, not a bit.' 'Let me see if I can help your memory,' I said. 'Devonshire, think of that word, now, and what it represents,--does it bring back anything to you?' 'Nothing, except that yearning. I have a feeling that I know something about it,--a great longing to--to--I hardly know what.' I tried him a little farther. 'Granitelands,--does that mean anything to you?' Again he hesitated. 'No, nothing.' 'Can you ever recall any remembrance of, or has the name of Maurice St. Mabyn any interest for you?' I asked this because, even in spite of what Captain Springfield had told me, vague fancies had come to me that perhaps there might be some mistake, and--and----but I dared not bring my thoughts to a conclusion.