The other had not risen. "I know all about that," he answered enigmatically. Alf drew a little nearer and dropped his voice, looking about him. "You can't marry her, Ern," he whispered. Ern was quite unmoved. "Can't I?" he said. "And why not then?" "_Because you can't!_" Alf almost screamed. Ernie was still amused. "I mustn't have her because you can't," he said. "That's the short of it." Alf cackled horribly. "Me!--Want her?--I like that." "I know you did then!" "Likely!" sneered Alf, his pride swift to arms. "Likely she'd ha took you and said no to me." He pressed closer, his face mottled. "_Do_ you know what I'm worth as I stand here in me shoes? I got £3,000 saved away in the Bank, and makin all the time. If I liked I could retire on meself--at 28--and be a gentleman. That's what I am! That's what I done! That's Alf Caspar! And you tell me she'd ha took up with a dirty coal-porter at 23s. 6d. a week when she could have had _Me_!" Ernie flared up. He leapt to his feet. "Out of it!" he ordered. "What the bloody l's my marriage got to do with you?" Alf tumbled down the wooden stairs with such a furious clatter as to bring the landlady to the kitchen-door. Later that evening he reported his brother's saying to the Reverend Spink. "Swore something fearful!" he said. "I couldn't tell you what he _did_ say. I couldn't reelly. Couldn't defile me lips with the words. That's the Army, I suppose. Pick up a lot of dirt there, some of em." The Reverend Spink, who boasted a moustache he believed to be military, rocked judicially to and fro before the fire. Since he had been ordained a Minister of the Established Church, and had lived in touch with the Archdeacon and Lady Augusta Willcocks, he felt very profoundly that the maintenance of the aristocratic and imperial tradition had been entrusted to his special keeping. "Had I not been called to a Higher Service," he said, enunciating his words with the meticulous care of one to whom correct pronunciation has always been a difficulty, "I should have gone into the Army, meself." He added--"An officer, of course." "Of course," repeated Alf, "as is only befitting a gentleman of your rank and stytion in life. No, I got nothing against the Army. Armies must be, as I tell them, and Navies too--if you're an Island. Only all I say is--_Leave it to others_, I says. You don't want your own family mixed up with _that_." But Alf was not done yet. He went over to Aldwoldston and tried to see Ruth. She refused, and reported him to Mrs. Trupp, who spoke very seriously to her husband. "William," she said, "you'll have to sack that man." He shook his head, grimly amused. "Can't be done," he replied. "Too interesting a study and too good a chauffeur," but he spoke to Alf all the same. "You must let that girl be," he said gruffly. "Ern's got her; and he's going to keep her."