He stopped, and the expression of his face changed suddenly. A sad, quiet look of tender yearning came into his clear brown eyes.
“You know, Dick,” he went on in a low, half-reverent tone. “I don’t want to marry. I never can.”
Dick’s heart stirred within him. “Mary,” he said, understandingly.
The other nodded, as though the memories were still too much for him. “I’m still miserably lonely for her,” he said. “Can’t help it simply. I feel utterly lost without her. Her memory to me is everything.” He looked deep into his pal’s eyes. “I’m married to that,” he added very firmly.
They pulled their cigarettes a moment in silence. They belonged to the male type that conceals emotion behind schoolboy language.
“It’s hard luck,” said Headley gently, “rotten luck, old man, I understand.” Arthur’s head nodded several times in succession as he smoked. He made no remark for some minutes. Then presently he said, as though it had no particular importance—for thus old friends show frankness to each other—“Besides, anyhow, it’s you the girl’s dying for, not me. She’s blind as a bat, old Blondin. Even when I’m with her—thrust with her by that old matchmaker for my sins—it’s you she talks about. All the talk leads up to you and yours. She’s devilish fond of you.” He paused a moment and looked searchingly into his friend’s face. “I say, old man—are you—I mean, do you mean business there? Because—excuse me interfering—but you’d better be careful. She’s a good sort, you know, after all.”
“Yes, Arthur, I do like her a bit,” Dick told him frankly. “But I can’t make up my mind quite. You see, it’s like this——”
And they talked the matter over as old friends will, until finally Arthur chucked his cigarette into the grate and got up to go. “Dead to the world,” he said, with a yawn. “I’m off to bed. Give you a chance, too,” he added with a laugh. It was after midnight.
The other turned, as though something had suddenly occurred to him.
“By the bye, Arthur,” he said abruptly, “what bird makes this sound? I heard it the other morning. Most extraordinary cry. You know everything that flies. What is it?” And, to the best of his ability, he imitated the strange three-note cry he had heard in the dawn two mornings before.