The boys had backed away apprehensively, and now were moving on down the street with frequent backward glances. It made no difference to him. For the present, they were of another age, an age of violence, an age which he had outgrown.
The drugstore was crowded, but Tom made his way toward the rear without noticing the customers. His thoughts were soberly and intently focused on the future. Perhaps, he considered, by the time his great grandchildren were men a way of life would have been created which involved neither the inevitability of war nor the alternate necessity for an invisible, poised bayonet. And so far as his own life was concerned, if the latter meant that he could return home, instead of trudging back to the barracks, then he accepted it gracefully. The price of peace was bound to be high, he reflected, since man had never before been able to afford it.
Sliding into the phonebooth and pushing a coin into the slot, Tom began dialing.