“Oh, that’s hardly fair,” laughed Trevelyan; “you’ve rehearsed all this before.  You’ve come prepared.”

“No, not at all,” frowned the general, sweeping on.  “He said that before he was raised to the bench, when he practised criminal law, he had brought word to a man that he was to be reprieved, and to another that he was to die.  Now, you know,” exclaimed the general, with a shrug, and appealing to the table, “how that would be done on the stage or in a novel, with the prisoner bound ready for execution, and a galloping horse, and a fluttering piece of white paper, and all that.  Well, now, Caithness told us that he went into the man’s cell and said, ‘You have been reprieved, John,’ or William, or whatever the fellow’s name was.  And the man looked at him and said:  ’Is that so?  That’s good—­that’s good;’ and that was all he said.  And then, again, he told one man whose life he had tried very hard to save:  ’The Home Secretary has refused to intercede for you.  I saw him at his house last night at nine o’clock.’  And the murderer, instead of saying, ’My God! what will my wife and children do?’ looked at him, and repeated, ‘At nine o’clock last night!’ just as though that were the important part of the message.”

“Well, but, general,” said Phillips, smiling, “that’s dramatic enough as it is, I think.  Why—­”

“Yes,” interrupted the general, quickly and triumphantly.  “But that is not what you would have made him say, is it?  That’s my point.”

“There was a man told me once,” Lord Arbuthnot began, leisurely—­“he was a great chum of mine, and it illustrates what Sir Henry has said, I think—­he was engaged to a girl, and he had a misunderstanding or an understanding with her that opened both their eyes, at a dance, and the next afternoon he called, and they talked it over in the drawing-room, with the tea-tray between them, and agreed to end it.  On the stage he would have risen and said, ’Well, the comedy is over, the tragedy begins, or the curtain falls;’ and she would have gone to the piano and played Chopin sadly while he made his exit.  Instead of which he got up to go without saying anything, and as he rose he upset a cup and saucer on the tea-table, and said, ‘Oh, I beg your pardon;’ and she said, ‘It isn’t broken;’ and he went out.  You see,” the young man added, smiling, “there were two young people whose hearts were breaking, and yet they talked of teacups, not because they did not feel, but because custom is too strong on us and too much for us.  We do not say dramatic things or do theatrical ones.  It does not make interesting reading, but it is the truth.”