But he could not look the farewell, and began slowly to go round the room, laying his hand upon each in turn--his favourite books and pictures, his piano, the violin, the cornet, and the big 'cello in its case where it stood in the corner--all such dear old friends, and it was good-bye for ever! And as he went on, his hand at last touched the little, long morocco case lying upon the side-table. He clutched it hard, and something like a sob struggled to his lips; for that case contained, in company with the little piccolo, the flute that was once the property of the brave old soldier whose helmet hung dented there with its drooping black horse-hair plume. Richard's thoughts went back into the past, and he recalled the evenings when he as a little child was enraptured listening to some operatic selection brilliantly played, while his mother sat accompanying upon the piano. Then he recollected the first lessons given him by his father upon that very flute, and years after the plaudits he listened to with burning cheeks after he had played one of his father's favourite pieces with such skill and execution that these words followed: "Keep the flute, Dick, my boy, for my sake; it is yours." And now he was bidding it farewell for ever--there in the darkness of that lonely night, whose silence was broken from time to time by the chiming and booming of the great Cathedral clock, which once more, to his disordered imagination, seemed associated with a solemn procession to the tomb. Richard Frayne's breast swelled and his hands trembled as his fingers clung round that little morocco case. Then, as a weak sob once more struggled for utterance, his breast swelled suddenly more and more, till there was a long, hard lump down the left side beneath the closely-buttoned jacket. For, quick as lightning, the little case had been transferred to his breast-pocket. It was his father's. He could not part from that. The rest of the favourite objects lying around were quickly touched; and then, there, in the middle of the room, the lad stood, feeling old and careworn, opposite two relics which he felt would be honourably removed from where they hung and sent away. He could not see them--and yet he could, inwardly, in his mind's eye-- the gilded metal helmet and the sabre. Then, as if performing some solemn act, the lad took a couple of steps towards the wall, gently and reverently lifted down the helmet, pressed his lips to the front, and put it back, to take down the sword and hold the blade and scabbard to his breast as he kissed the hilt. Saddened visions came trooping before his closed eyes in that darkness-- of himself: a man, a soldier, as his father had been, an officer leading men against the enemies of his country; and at that, in his despair, he uttered a low, piteous sigh, and hung the sword in its place.