Two days later Matron collared me in the passage and gave me a handful of letters and things to distribute.  There was a fat parcel for Martha, the ward-maid.  I found her in the closet where she keeps her brooms, and gave it her.  Her eyes simply danced as she took it, first carefully wiping her hand on her apron.

“It’s from my bruvver,” she explained. “’Im on Salisbury Plain.  Very good to me ’e always is.”  She stripped off the paper and gave a sigh of rapture.  “Lor, Nurse, ain’t it beautiful?”

It was a chocolate box, a comfortable-looking chocolate box, ornamented with a red-headed St. George, a large blue dragon and a vivid orange bow.

“It does seem nice,” I agreed.

“Fancy ’im spending all that on me,” said Martha.

“You’ll be able to have quite a feast,” said I, smiling at my old friend St. George.

Martha looked suddenly shy.

“I’m not going to keep it,” she confided.  She came closer to me.  “Do you remember young Renshaw, what used to be in your ward, Nurse?”

I nodded; I remembered him well, a cheery boy with a smashed leg, now in a Convalescent Home by the sea.

“’Im and me’s engaged,” said Martha in a hoarse whisper.  “I liked ’im and he liked me, and one day I was doing the windows ’e asked me.  ’E says the food down there is that monopolous, so I’ll send him this ’ere just to cheer ’im up like.”

It seemed an excellent idea to me.  I beamed upon Martha.  I helped her to re-wrap St. George, and lent her my fountain-pen to write the address which was to send my Knight once more upon his travels.  It appeared to me that he and his dragon were seeing a lot of life.

Bobbie had arranged to call for me on his birthday, so when my off duty came I simply flung on my things and raced for the hall.  As I passed Matron’s door she called me in.  I entered trembling; it was always a toss-up with Matron whether you were to be smiled upon or strafed.

To-day she was lamb-like.  She sat at a desk piled high with papers.  Among them lay a vivid coloured object.

“I’ve just had a letter from that young Renshaw,” she said.  “Such a charming letter, thanking us for all our kindness and enclosing a present to show his appreciation.”  She smiled.  She seemed hugely pleased about something.  “He addresses it to me,” she went on; “but, though I am grateful for the kind thought, I do not myself eat chocolates.”

She picked up the box, a comfortable-looking box ornamented with an orange satin bow.

“I think these are more in your line than mine,” she said, “and Renshaw was in your ward.  You have really the best right to them.”

She handed me the box of chocolates.  I gazed at my travelled Saint and he gazed back.  I could almost have sworn he winked.

Clutching him and his dragon, I departed and danced down the corridor into the hall.  There waited Bobbie, red-haired and khaki-clad, more like St. George than the gallant knight himself.