.

.
The Major lay on his hospital bed and stared at the ceiling.

It was all very well, but ten years had made a difference--a mighty difference; a difference which beat all his calculations.

It was a double difference, too; for all the while that he had been shrinking in self-knowledge, his reputation at home had been expanding like a cucumber.
Good Lord! How could he live up to it now?
To obey his impulses and declare himself was simple enough, perhaps; but afterwards-- He had nearly betrayed himself when Cai Tamblyn--in a queer straight-cut frock-coat of livery, blue with brass buttons, but otherwise looking much the same as ever--thrust his head in at the door.
In the first shock of astonishment the Major had almost cried out on him by name.
"Why--eh ?--what are _you_ doing here ?" he stammered.

Hitherto he had been waited on by a strange doctor (Hansombody's new partner) and a nurse whom he had assisted twelve years ago, when she was left a widow, to set up as a midwife.
"Might ask the same question of you," said Cai Tamblyn.