The tramp had seized his opportunity, and only Brownlow's hastily flung-up arm had saved his head. And his "Damn" announced the result. It wasn't the first time he'd had an arm broken, and only too well he knew the meaning of that sickening numbness.
"Quick," he gasped. "Quick—for God's sake! I'm all right."
And then suddenly Brownlow's eyes grew bright He forgot the pain: forgot everything save the strategy necessary for the moment. For the girl had come round the back of the car with a heavy spanner in her hand. She was behind the tramp, and at all costs he must be prevented from looking round. So with one wild dart, broken arm and all, John Brownlow sprang forward. Thud came the stick on his head and he felt something wet trickling down his neck; crack came the spanner on the tramp's jaw and he dropped without a sound into the road.
"Beautiful," said Brownlow weakly. "Beautiful." And he swayed dangerously.
"Into the car," said the girl quietly. "You're going to faint in a minute, and I can't lift you."
And then she made a little dart forward to hold him up, but it was too late. With a little sigh John Brownlow collapsed on to the dusty road and lay still.
"Good Lord, old thing! What's the new game?'"
"Thank Heaven, you've come. Tony," cried the girl, as a large young man got rapidly out of his car. "The situation was getting a bit beyond me. That object"—she continued, pointing to the tramp— "attacked me as I was trying to adjust the magneto. And then that other object came on the scene and attacked the tramp." She indicated Brownlow with the spanner.
"Good for him," said the large young man.
"The tramp knocked him out, just as I knocked the tramp out. With this." She brandished the spanner. "And, Tony, I think I'll sit down a moment." His arm was round her waist in an instant, and she gave a little laugh that was half a sob. "He seems to know me, Tony," she said at length. "But I'm sure I don't know him."
"Some labourer, old thing," said the large young man soothingly. "Look here—leave it all to me. Are you fit to drive your bus home? You are. Good! Then pop along. I'll take this sportsman straight off to the hospital; and I'll take the other swine straight off to the police-station. And then I'll come along up and see you."
Which was how I, being in charge of the aforesaid hospital, came into the picture, and decided that after due reflection to tell this story. Not that I thought, when Tony Barston delivered a dusty wreck with a bloodstained head at the door, that there was any story in it. It all seemed most prosaic. But subsequently—However, all in due course.
It was three hours later that he recovered consciousness and turned a pair of puzzled grey eyes on me.
"You're in hospital, my man," I said. "Broken arm and a clip on the head. But you did well. My congratulations."
"How is Miss Lovelace?" he asked, and I looked at him quickly. For the voice was the voice of a man who had been to an English public school.
"Quite all right," I said. "And now—for purposes of verification—I'd like some particulars about you. What's your name?"
"Brownlow," he answered. "John Brownlow." And then he smiled faintly. "I'm on a walking tour."
"Where you ought to be is in a sanatorium," I said shortly. "I've been overhauling you while you were unconscious."
"Deuced kind of you. Doctor," he remarked. "My trouble is that most of these English sanatoria are so cheap and nasty that they're quite impossible for a man of my means."
And then he started to cough. My God! how that poor devil racked himself: it was pitiful to watch.
"Bellows to mend," he spluttered at length. "But they're beyond mending now."
"When did it start?" I said.
"France—gas." he whispered, and lay back exhausted.
There was a knock on the door behind me and a policeman entered. "Can I get an account from him now, sir, as to what happened? We've got the other bloke in the cells." He stopped short and gave a little whistle. "Well, I'm blowed." And he was staring at John Brownlow's face.
"Do you know him?" I said, leading him from the room.
"He was only let out this morning, sir," he answered. "The General gave him a month for sleeping in Giles's barn and being in possession of medals that wasn't his."
"Is that so?" I said thoughtfully. "Anyway, he's not fit to talk now; you must come back later." And with that I went to John Brownlow. "Look here, Brownlow," I said, "I don't want to pry into your private affairs. But I don't suppose I shall be saying anything you don't know when I tell you that you're a pretty sick man."
He grinned feebly. "How long do you give me, Doctor?"
"If it hadn't been for this show this morning—a few months with reasonable care. As it is—it's weakened you badly. Now, how comes it that you, with about the quarter of one lung left as the result of gas, and so many bullet wounds in your body that you look like a slice of plum cake, were sent to prison for a month by Sir Hubert? You could have proved your case a genuine one."
"Think so?" he answered casually. "Perhaps I didn't want to." And then he raised himself on his elbow and stared at me. "There comes a time, Doctor, when one sees things in their true perspective. I came to these parts on my—on my walking tour, by pure chance. I didn't even know Lovelace Towers was in the district. But there is a destiny that shapes our ends—though I didn't believe it once. And maybe this morning's little effort will help to pay—a big debt."
And not another word could I get out of him.
It was when I got back in the evening that I noticed the change. The nurse told me he'd been light-headed during the afternoon, and then she looked at me curiously. "He's done nothing but talk about Sir Hubert, Doctor," she said. "And that son of his. Keeps on saying that he should have had the D.C.M.—and swearing at someone else—somebody called Milligan."
I glanced at John Brownlow, and the change that betokens the coming of the Big Sleep was much more apparent. And even as I looked at him he sat up in bed.
"By God! Joe Milligan," he cried, "if you tell the old man, I'll murder you. I taught him, I say: I taught him. It's my fault."
"Steady, old man," I said. "Steady."
"To hell with you!" he shouted. "Do you promise?"
"Yes; I promise," I answered, and it pacified him at once.
"He's been like that the whole time,' she whispered, and I nodded.
"It's not for much longer, nurse. I don't think he can last the night."
It was about eight o'clock that John Brownlow opened his eyes, and they were sane once more.
"I want to see Sir Hubert," he whispered, as I bent over his bed. "Please get him. It's urgent."
"I'll try," I said, and went to the telephone.
I explained matters to the General and he said he'd come at once. Then I went back to Brownlow, and he nodded his head as if satisfied. He didn't speak for a while, but just lay there in bed staring out of the window.
"It's the last time I'll see that, isn't it, Doctor?" he said at length.
"Humanly speaking, it is." I answered quietly, and a faint smile crossed his face.
"Tell me about Sir Hubert's son," was his next remark, and I looked at him in astonishment.
"He was killed in the War," I said, and he shook his head irritably.
"I know that," he cried. "But what does his father think about it? He heard, didn't he? He got a letter telling him."
"He got a letter from a man called Drayton," I answered. "Saying that Jack had died finely. And that he ought to have been given a decoration."
"Good," muttered Brownlow. And with that he closed his eyes once more and lay motionless. Once, in fact, I thought