Mr. Brougham sighed. This was not the tone of young men suddenly roused to a new vision of patriotism. He said aloud: "I was glad you felt financially able to take a bond yourself, David."
"Oh, yes," answered his son. "I sold my boat yesterday."
Mr. Brougham was not so Spartan a parent that he did not feel a pang to think of the boy without his favorite pastime on this perhaps his last summer.
"Quite right," he said. "This is no year for pleasure boats."
"You get a good price for boats this year," said David.
There it was again—that note Mr. Brougham didn't like. Even if David's motives had been financial and not patriotic he might have allowed Lawrence to see an example of self-sacrifice. Instead Lawrence was getting just like his brother.
Brougham was not a man who habitually eased his burdens by casting them on his wife, but that night when they went upstairs he took her into his confidence.
"Are you satisfied with David's attitude toward the war?" he began.
She was a silent, deep woman whose actions always astonished those who had no intuitive knowledge of the great general trends of her nature. She and David usually understood each other fairly well.
Now she shook her head. "No," she said.