thing which it seems to me a chap ought to win instead of getting it as a
gift.

'But I'm gassing. I was going to tell you how it was that I'd seen
fighting. My father was in the British Navy. He rose to the rank of
Captain, and then had an offer from the Turkish Government of a place in
the Naval Arsenal at Constantinople.'

'From the Turks!' said Burney in evident surprise.

'Yes. Lots of our people were in Turkey in those days. It was a British
officer, Admiral Gamble, who managed all the Turkish naval affairs. That
was before the Germans got their claws into the wretched country.'

'I've heard of Admiral Gamble,' put in Burney. 'Well, what happened then?'

'My father took the job, and did jolly well until the Germans started
their games. Finally they got hold of everything, and five years ago
Admiral Gamble gave up. So did my father, but he had bought land in Turkey
and had a lot of friends there, so he did not go back to England.

'It was that same year, 1910, that he found coal on his land, and applied
for a concession to work it. The Turks liked him. They'd have given it him
like a shot. But the Germans got behind his back, and did him down. The
end was that they refused to let him work his coal.

'Of course he was awfully sick, but not half so sick as when a German
named Henkel came along and offered to buy him out at about half the price
he had originally paid for the place.