“Checkmate!”

Then did his gaze wander from knight to bishop and bishop to castle in a vain search for succour.  There was his king defied by a bishop—­a bishop which had been hobnobbing with pawns in one corner of the board, and which he could have sworn he had captured and removed full twenty minutes before.  He mentioned this impression to Halibut.

“That was the other one,” said his foe.  “I thought you had forgotten this.  I have been watching and hoping so for the last half-hour.”

There was no disguising the coarse satisfaction of the man.  He had watched and hoped.  Not beaten him, so the Major told himself, in fair play, but by taking a mean and pitiful advantage of a pure oversight.  A sheer oversight.  He admitted it.

Halibut rose with a sigh of relief, and the Major, mechanically sweeping up the pieces, dropped them one by one into the box.

“Plenty of time,” said the victor, glancing at the clock.  “I shall go now, but I should like a wash first.”

The Major rose, and in his capacity of host led the way upstairs to his room, and poured fresh water for his foe.  Halibut washed himself delicately, carefully trimming his hair and beard, and anxiously consulting the Major as to the set of his coat in the back, after he had donned it again.

His toilet completed, he gave a satisfied glance in the glass, and then followed the man of war sedately down stairs.  At the hall he paused, and busied himself with the clothes-brush and hat-pad, modestly informing his glaring friend that he could not afford to throw any chances away, and then took his departure.

The Major sat up late that night waiting for news, but none came, and by breakfast-time next morning his thirst for information became almost uncontrollable.  He toyed with a chop and allowed his coffee to get cold.  Then he clapped on his hat and set off to Halibut’s to know the worst.

“Well?” he inquired, as he followed the other into his dining-room.

“I went,” said Halibut, waving him to a chair.

“Am I to congratulate you?”

“Well, I don’t know,” was the reply; “perhaps not just yet.”

“What do you mean by that?” said the Major, irascibly.

“Well, as a matter of fact,” said Halibut, “she refused me, but so nicely and so gently that I scarcely minded it.  In fact, at first I hardly realized that she had refused me.”

The Major rose, and regarding his poor friend kindly, shook and patted him lightly on the shoulder.

“She’s a splendid woman,” said Halibut.  “Ornament to her sex,” remarked the Major.

“So considerate,” murmured the bereaved one.

“Good women always are,” said the Major, decisively.  “I don’t think I’d better worry her to-day, Halibut, do you?”

“No, I don’t,” said Halibut, stiffly.

“I’ll try my luck to-morrow,” said the Major.