“You wait till you get married, my dear,” said her only friend, drawing closer to the fence. “Harry will get you one.”

His hopeful craze seemed to mock her own want of hope with so bitter an aptness that in her nervous irritation she could have screamed at him outright. But she only said in self-mockery, and speaking to him as though he had been sane, “Why, Captain Hagberd, your son may not even want to look at me.”

He flung his head back and laughed his throaty affected cackle of anger.

“What! That boy? Not want to look at the only sensible girl for miles around? What do you think I am here for, my dear—my dear—my dear? … What? You wait. You just wait. You’ll see to-morrow. I’ll soon—”

“Bessie! Bessie! Bessie!” howled old Carvil inside. “Bessie!—my pipe!” That fat blind man had given himself up to a very lust of laziness. He would not lift his hand to reach for the things she took care to leave at his very elbow. He would not move a limb; he would not rise from his chair, he would not put one foot before another, in that parlour (where he knew his way as well as if he had his sight), without calling her to his side and hanging all his atrocious weight on her shoulder. He would not eat one single mouthful of food without her close attendance. He had made himself helpless beyond his affliction, to enslave her better. She stood still for a moment, setting her teeth in the dusk, then turned and walked slowly indoors.

Captain Hagberd went back to his spade. The shouting in Carvil’s cottage stopped, and after a while the window of the parlour downstairs was lit up. A man coming from the end of the street with a firm leisurely step passed on, but seemed to have caught sight of Captain Hagberd, because he turned back a pace or two. A cold white light lingered in the western sky. The man leaned over the gate in an interested manner.

“You must be Captain Hagberd,” he said, with easy assurance.

The old man spun round, pulling out his spade, startled by the strange voice.

“Yes, I am,” he answered nervously.

The other, smiling straight at him, uttered very slowly: “You’ve been advertising for your son, I believe?”

“My son Harry,” mumbled Captain Hagberd, off his guard for once. “He’s coming home tomorrow.”

“The devil he is!” The stranger marvelled greatly, and then went on, with only a slight change of tone: “You’ve grown a beard like Father Christmas himself.”

Captain Hagberd drew a little nearer, and leaned forward over his spade. “Go your way,” he said, resentfully and timidly at the same time, because he was always afraid of being laughed at. Every mental state, even madness, has its equilibrium based upon self-esteem. Its disturbance causes unhappiness; and Captain Hagberd lived amongst a scheme of settled notions which it pained him to feel disturbed by people’s grins. Yes, people’s grins were awful. They hinted at something wrong: but what? He could not tell; and that stranger was obviously grinning—had come on purpose to grin. It was bad enough on the streets, but he had never before been outraged like this.

The stranger, unaware how near he was of having his head laid open with a spade, said seriously: “I am not trespassing where I stand, am I? I fancy there’s something wrong about your news. Suppose you let me come in.”

“You come in!” murmured old Hagberd, with inexpressible horror.

“I could give you some real information about your son—the very latest tip, if you care to hear.”