The captain leaped to his feet and returned this salutation of warriors;
the door opened and closed, and the officer stood staring at the space so
lately occupied by the man who, for eighteen months, had been his right
hand.

"Strange man!" he muttered. "I didn't know they bred his kind any more.
Why, he's a feudal baron!"




III

There were three people in the observation-car when Michael Joseph
Farrel boarded it a few minutes before eight o'clock the following
morning. Of the three, one was a girl, and, as Farrel entered,
carrying the souvenirs of his service--a helmet and gas-mask--she
glanced at him with the interest which the average civilian manifests
in any soldier obviously just released from service and homeward bound.
Farrel's glance met hers for an instant with equal interest; then he
turned to stow his impedimenta in the brass rack over his seat. He was
granted an equally swift but more direct appraisal of her as he walked
down the observation-car to the rear platform, where he selected a
chair in a corner that offered him sanctuary from the cold, fog-laden
breeze, lighted a cigar, and surrendered himself to contemplating, in
his mind's eye, the joys of home-coming.

He had the platform to himself until after the train had passed Palo
Alto, when others joined him. The first to emerge on the platform was
a Japanese. Farrel favored him with a cool, contemptuous scrutiny, for