"It's absurd," he repeated, "there's another will somewhere. David would
never have done that." He struck that note at the start, and cursed
David all the deeper in the depths of his diplomatic soul. Rose looked
at him gratefully, kindly.

"I think there is another will somewhere," she said, "but I am sure it
will never be found. It's no use to think or talk of it, Edmund."

He fidgeted for a moment with the china on the chimney-piece.

"For 'auld lang syne,' Rose," he said in a very low voice, "and because
you might possibly, just possibly, have made something of me if you had
chosen, let me know a little more about it. I want to see what was in
his last letter."

Rose flushed deeply. It was difficult to say why she yielded except that
most people did yield to Grosse if he got them alone. She drew off the
third finger of her left hand a very remarkable diamond ring and gave it
to him. Then she took out of a drawer a faded photograph of a young,
commonplace, open-faced officer, now framed in an exquisite stamped
leather case, and handed that to him also. He saw that she hesitated.

"May I have the rest," he said very gently. Even her mother had never
seen the piece of paper. No, she could not show that. Edmund did not
insist further, and a moment later he seemed to have forgotten that she
had not given him what he asked for.

"Did he often wear this ring?"

"Never. I never saw it till now, and I had never seen the photograph."