Armed with this document, which was given him in all good faith, he went to yet another garrison town, where he had come to know a major who was going to be put in command of a new battalion. This major had taken a great fancy to him; and the result was that one evening Little Yeogh Wough came home and announced that at last he had got his heart's desire.
"It's a certainty, Big Yeogh Wough. It can't go wrong now. It was that certificate that did it. They never put me through any eyesight test at all. Now I can look Edward Brennan in the face. Let us have him here for a week."
I told him how glad I was. And it was true that I was glad, for his whole look had changed.
But deep down in my heart I felt as if an iron hand were clutching at me.
"Once I get the commission, I'll soon manage to get out to the Front," he laughed confidently.
"Yes," I said, and laughed too. But the iron clutch at my heart came again.
"I must see about my outfit at once. And then I shall have to go into rooms at Norwich to be with my battalion. I shall have to change out of it later on if I find it's only going to be a Home Service one."
Even with all his energy about his outfit, his name was in the gazette before his new uniform was ready. Yet it was not long before a Sunday morning came when he made his first public appearance in the neighbourhood as a second lieutenant, going to church with his sister to show how the best quality cloth, the best cut, the best shade of khaki, the best Sam Browne belt and all the other accessories could increase the attractiveness of a boy with a fine figure and with that "dignity of the watch-chain" sort of fascination about him which I have tried to explain already.
"I don't agree with the people who say that khaki is not becoming," I said to his father after he had gone. "It must be becoming, because, since the war broke out, I've had a stronger and stronger impression every day that England is full of good-looking men."
"I must see what Edward Brennan looks like in his khaki," I thought.
But Edward was still waiting for his commission and so was in his ordinary clothes. But the thrill of the war was in him and it was a new Edward who was with us now and sat at the piano, and with his long fingers brought from the keys music that had a strange new meaning in it.