‘Oh, take care!’ shrieked Miss Martin.  ’It would be awkward—­on the lips.  Do you see my ring?’

Merton and Logan examined her ring.  It was a beautiful cinque cento jewel in white and blue enamel, with a high gold top containing a pointed ruby.

‘It’s very pretty,’ said Merton—­’quite of the best period.  But what is the mystery?’

‘It is a poison ring of the Borgias,’ said Miss Martin.  ’I borrowed it from Sir Josiah Wilkinson.  If it scratched you’ (here she exhibited the mechanism of the jewel), ‘why, there you are!’

‘Where?  Poisoned?’

‘No!  Vaccinated!’ said Miss Martin.  ’It is full of the stuff they vaccinate you with, but it is quite safe as far as the old poison goes.  Sir Josiah sterilised it, in case of accidents, before he put in the glycerinated lymph.  My own idea!  He was delighted.  Shall I shake hands with the office-boy?—­it might do him good—­or would Kutuzoff give a paw?’

Kutuzoff was the Russian cat.

‘By no means—­not for worlds,’ said Merton.  ’Kutuzoff is a Conscientious Objector.  But were you going to shake hands with Miss Truman with that horrible ring?  Sacred emblems enamelled on it,’ said Merton, gingerly examining the jewel.

‘No; I was not going to do that,’ replied Miss Martin.  ’My idea was to acquire the confidence of the lover—­the younger Mr. Warren—­explain to him how the thing works, lend it to him, and then let him press his Jane’s wrist with it in some shady arbour.  Then his Jane would have been all that the heart of Mr. Warren pere could desire.  But it did not come off.’

‘Thank goodness!’ ejaculated Merton.  ’There might have been an awful row.  I don’t know what the offence would have been in the eye of the law.  Vaccinating a Conscientious Objector, without consent, yet without violence,—­what would the law say to that?’

‘We might make it hamesucken under trust in Scotland,’ said Logan, ’if it was done on the premises of the young lady’s domicile.’

‘We have not that elegant phrase in England,’ said Merton.  ’Perhaps it would have been a common assault; but, anyhow, it would have got into the newspapers.  Never again be officer of mine, Miss Martin.’

‘But how did all end happily?’ asked Logan.

’Why, you may call it happily and so may the lovers, but I call it very disappointing,’ said Miss Martin.

‘Tell us all about it!’ cried Logan.

‘Well, I went down, simple as you see me.’

‘Simplex munditiis!’ said Merton.

’And was met at the station by young Mr. Warren.  His father, with the wisdom of a Nonconformist serpent, had sent him alone to make my acquaintance and be fascinated.  My things were put on a four-wheeler.  I was all young enthusiasm in the manner of The Young Girl.  He was a good-looking boy enough, though in a bowler hat, with turn-down collar.  But he was gloomy.  I was curious about the public buildings, ecstatic about the town hall, and a kind of Moeso-Gothic tabernacle (if it was not Moeso-Gothic in style I don’t know what it was) where the Rev. Mr. Truman holds forth.  But I could not waken him up, he seemed miserable.  I soon found out the reason.  The placards of the local newspapers shrieked in big type with