"Oh I shan't say don't move" Lawrence murmured. "The slippers also. . . . Are there many trout in this river, I wonder? Hallo! there's a big fellow rubbing along by that black stone! Must weigh a cool pound and a half. I suppose the angling rights go with the property?"
"You can fish all day long if you like: the water is ours, both sides of it, as far south as the mill above Wharton and a good half-mile upstream. The banks are kept clear on principle, though none of us ever touch a line. The Castle people come over now and then: Jack Bendish is keen, and he says our sport is better than theirs because they fish theirs down too much. Val put some stock in this spring."
"Val?"
"You seem to fit in so naturally," Laura smiled, "that I forget you've only just come. Val is Bernard's agent, and I ought not to have omitted him from our list of country neighbours, but he's like one of the family. Bernard wants you, to meet him because he was near you in the war. But I don't know that you'll have much in common: Val was very junior to you, and he's not keen on talking about it in any case. So many men have that shrinking. Have you, I wonder?"
"I'm afraid I don't take impressions easily. Didn't your friend enjoy it?"
"He had no chance. He had only six or seven weeks at the front; he was barely nineteen, poor boy, when he was invalided out. That was why Bernard offered him the agency—he was delighted to lend a helping hand to one of his old brother officers."
"Wounded?"
"Yes, he had his right arm smashed by a revolver bullet. Then rheumatic fever set in, and the trouble went to the heart, and he was very ill for a long time. I don't suppose he ever has been so strong as he was before. What made it so sad was the splendid way he had just distinguished himself," Laura continued. She gave a little sketch of the rescue of Dale, far more vivid than Val had ever given to his family. "Perhaps you can imagine what a fuss Chilmark made over its solitary hero! We're still proud of him. Val is always in request at local shows: he appears on the platform looking very shy and bored. Poor boy! I believe he sometimes wishes he had never won that embarrassing decoration."
"What's his name?"
"Val Stafford. Why—do you remember him?"