"It was when King Heremon ruled over Ireland," she continued. "I
did a very foolish and a wicked thing, and was punished for it by
being cast out from the companionship of my fellows. Since
then"--the coat made the slightest of pathetic gestures--"I have
wandered alone."

It ought to have sounded so ridiculous to them both; told on English
soil in the year One Thousand Nine Hundred and Fourteen to a smart
young officer of Engineers and an elderly Oxford Professor. Across
the road the doctor's odd man was opening garage doors; a noisy milk
cart was clattering through the village a little late for the London
train; a faint odour of eggs and bacon came wafted through the
garden, mingled with the scent of lavender and pinks. For Commander
Raffleton, maybe, there was excuse. This story, so far as it has
gone, has tried to make that clear. But the Professor! He ought to
have exploded in a burst of Homeric laughter, or else to have shaken
his head at her and warned her where little girls go to who do this
sort of thing.

Instead of which he stared from Commander Raffleton to Malvina, and
from Malvina back to Commander Raffleton with eyes so astonishingly
round that they might have been drawn with a compass.

"God bless my soul!" said the Professor. "But this is most
extraordinary!"

"Was there a King Heremon of Ireland?" asked Commander Raffleton.
The Professor was a well-known authority on these matters.