"I don't want to stay behind."
"Then, it's for you to judge, my son."
There was something like an affectionate stress on the two concluding monosyllables. Ashley backed off, out of the lamplight.
"It's this way," he explained, stammeringly; "I'm a British officer and gentleman. I'm a little more than that—since I'm a V.C. man—and a fellow—dash it all, I might as well say it!—I'm a fellow they've got their eye on—in the line of high office, don't you know? And I can't—I simply can't—let a chap like that make me a present of all his chances—"
"Did he have any?"
Ashley hesitated. "Before God, sir, I don't know—but I'm inclined to think—he had. If so, I suppose they're of as much value to him as mine to me."
"But not of any more."
He hesitated again. "I don't know about that. Perhaps they are. The Lord knows I don't say that lightly, for mine are—Well, we needn't go into that. But I've got a good deal in my life, and I don't imagine that he, poor devil—"
"Oh, don't worry. A rich soil is never barren. When nothing is planted in it, Nature uses it for flowers."
Ashley answered restively. "I see, sir, your sympathies are all on his side."