The General shrugged his shoulders.  “Oh, Saffron be hanged!  He’s not the British Army,” he said.

CHAPTER III

MR. SAFFRON AT HOME

To put it plainly, Sergeant Hooper—­he had been a Sergeant for a brief and precarious three weeks, but he used the title in civil life whenever he safely could, and he could at Inkston—­Sergeant Hooper was a villainous-looking dog.  Beaumaroy, fresh from the comely presences of Old Place, unconscious of how the General had ripped up his character and record, pleasantly nursing a little project concerning Dr. Mary Arkroyd, had never been more forcibly struck with his protege’s ill-favoredness than when he arrived home on this same evening, and the Sergeant met him at the door.

“By gad, Sergeant,” he observed pleasantly, “I don’t think anybody could be such a rascal as you look.  It’s that faith that carries me through.”

The Sergeant helped him off with his coat.  “It’s some people’s stock-in-trade,” he remarked, “not to look a rascal like they really are, sir.”  The “sir” stuck out of pure habit; it carried no real implication of respect.

“Meaning me!” laughed Beaumaroy.  “How’s the old man to-night?”

“Quiet enough.  He’s in the Tower there—­been there an hour or more.”

The cottage door opened on to a narrow passage, with a staircase on one side, and on the other a door leading to a small square parlor, cheerfully if cheaply furnished, and well lit by an oil lamp.  A fire blazed on the hearth, and Beaumaroy sank into a “saddle-bag” armchair beside it, with a sigh of comfort.  The Sergeant had jerked his head towards another door, on the right of the fireplace; it led to the Tower.  Beaumaroy’s eyes settled on it.

“An hour or more, has he?  Have you heard anything?”

“He was making a speech a little while back, that’s all.”

“No more complaints and palpitations, or anything of that sort?”

“Not as I’ve heard.  But he never says much to me.  Mrs. Wiles gets the benefit of his symptoms mostly.”

“You’re not sympathetic, perhaps.”

During the talk Hooper had been to a cupboard and mixed a glass of whisky and soda.  He brought it to Beaumaroy and put it on a small table by him.  Beaumaroy regarded his squat paunchy figure, red face, small eyes (a squint in one of them), and bulbous nose with a patient and benign toleration.

“Since you can’t expect, Sergeant, to prepossess the judge and jury in your favor, the instant you make your appearance in the box—­”

“Here, what are you on to, sir?”

“It’s the more important for you to have it clearly in your mind that we are laboring in the cause of humanity, freedom, and justice.  Exactly like the Allies in the late war, you know, Sergeant.  Keep that in your mind, clinch it!  He hasn’t wanted you to do anything particular to-night, or asked for me?”