And below in the room the two men for a little sat not speaking of the
ghoulish thing. Barlow had drawn the papers from his pocket; he passed
them silently across the table.
Hodson, almost mechanically, had stretched a hand for them, and when
they were opened, and he saw the seal, and realised what they were,
some curious guttural sound issued from his lips as if he had waked in
affright from a nightmare. He pulled a drawer of the desk open, took
out a cheroot--and lighted it. Then he commenced to speak, slowly,
droppingly, as one speaks who has suddenly been detected in a crime.
He put a flat hand on the papers, holding them to the desk. And it was
Elizabeth he spoke of at first, as if the thing under his palm, that
meant danger to an empire, was subservient.
"Barlow, my boy," he said, "I'm old, I'm tired."
The Captain, looking into the drawn face, had a curious feeling that
Hodson was at least a hundred. There was a floaty wonderment in his
mind why the fifty-five-years'-service retirement rule had not been
enforced in the Colonel's case.
Pages:
143
144
145
146
147
148
149
150
151
152
153
154
155
156
157
158
159
160
161
162
163
164
165
166
167