His quick eyes had detected at a glance something that others had never taken the trouble to discover.

From the very beginning he had been aware of a force that contained itself in this silent man.

He had become interested, scarcely knowing why; and, having at length overcome the prickly hedge of reserve which was at first opposed to his advances, he had entered the private place which it defended, and found within--what he certainly had not expected to find--a genius.
It was nearly three months now since Conyers, in a moment of unusual expansion, had laid before him the invention at which he had been working for so many silent years.

The thing even then, though complete in all essentials, had lacked finish, and this final touch young Palliser, himself a gunner with a positive passion for guns, had been able to supply.

He had seen the value of the invention and had given it his ardent support.