very existence, Thomas could be silent, too, and would presently
saunter away, stuffing his pipe, without even the common courtesy
of piling his dishes together for her washing. Thomas held long
conversations with his master as they idled about the place; Clara
would hear their laughter. The manservant slept in a small shed
detached from the main house, and there were times when he did not
appear in the morning. At such times Gerald with a pot of strong
coffee likewise disappeared into the cabin.

"Pore old rotter!" the husband would say generously. "He's a
decentish sort, don't you know? I meanter say, poor old Thomas did
me an awfully good turn once--and that!"

Clara inferred from various hints that Gerald had once been in the
English army, and had met Thomas, and befriended him, or been
befriended by him, at that period of his existence. But, greatly
to the little bride's disappointment, Gerald never spoke of his
old home or his connections there. Clara had to draw what comfort
she could from his intimation that all his relatives were
unbelievably eminent and distinguished, the least of them superior
in brain and achievement to any American who ever drew the breath
of life.

And presently she forgot Thomas, forgot the petty annoyance of
cooking and summer heat and dogs and physical discomfort, in the
overwhelming prayer that the coming child, about whose advent
Gerald, at first annoyed, had later been so generously good-
natured, might prove a boy. Gerald, living uncomplainingly in this
dreadful little country town, enduring Western conditions with
such dignity, and loving his little wife despite her undertaker