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54
THE RETURN OF THE SOLDIER
again. Then he raised his head again, brisk with another subject. "Do they still have trouble with foxes at Steppy End?"
Kitty shook her head.
"I don't know."
"Griffiths will know," Chris said cheerily, and swung round on his seat to ask the butler, and found him osseous, where Griffiths was rotund; dark, where Griffiths had been merrily mottled; strange, where Griffiths had been a part of home, a condition of life. He sat back in his chair as though his heart had stopped.
When the butler who is not Griffiths had left the room he spoke gruffly.
"Stupid of me, I know; but where is Griffiths?"
"Dead seven years ago," said Kitty, her eyes on her plate.
He sighed deeply in a shuddering horror.
