At that moment Jeffreys entered the room with the documents.  Sir Robert handed the deed of partnership to Alan, and when he had identified it, took it from him again and threw it on the fire, saying that of course the formal letter of release would be posted and the dissolution notified in the Gazette.  Then the transfer was signed and the cheque delivered.

“Well, good-bye till Saturday,” said Alan when he had received the latter, and nodding to them both, he turned and left the room.

The passage ran past the little room in which Mr. Jeffreys, the head clerk, sat alone.  Catching sight of him through the open door, Alan entered, shutting it behind him.  Finding his key ring he removed from it the keys of his desk and of the office strongroom, and handed them to the clerk who, methodical in everything, proceeded to write a formal receipt.

“You are leaving us, Major Vernon?” he said interrogatively as he signed the paper.

“Yes, Jeffreys,” answered Alan, then prompted by some impulse, added, “Are you sorry?”

Mr. Jeffreys looked up and there were traces of unwonted emotion upon his hard, regulated face.

“For myself, yes, Major—­for you, on the whole, no.”

“What do you mean, Jeffreys?  I do not quite understand.”

“I mean, Major, that I am sorry because you have never tried to shuffle off any shady business on to my back and leave me to bear the brunt of it; also because you have always treated me as a gentleman should, not as a machine to be used until a better can be found, and kicked aside when it goes out of order.”

“It is very kind of you to say so, Jeffreys, but I can’t remember having done anything particular.”

“No, Major, you can’t remember what comes natural to you.  But I and the others remember, and that’s why I am sorry.  But for yourself I am glad, since although Aylward and Haswell have put a big thing through and are going to make a pot of money, this is no place for the likes of you, and now that you are going I will make bold to tell you that I always wondered what you were doing here.  By and by, Major, the row will come, as it has come more than once in the past, before your time.”

“And then?” said Alan, for he was anxious to get to the bottom of this man’s mind, which hitherto he had always found so secret.

“And then, Major, it won’t matter much to Messrs. Aylward and Champers-Haswell, who are used to that kind of thing and will probably dissolve partnership and lie quiet for a bit, and still less to folk like myself, who are only servants.  But if you were still here it would have mattered a great deal to you, for it would blacken your name and break your heart, and then what’s the good of the money?  I tell you, Major,” the clerk went on with quiet intensity, “though I am nobody and nothing, if I could afford it I would follow your example.  But I can’t, for I have a sick wife and a family