Olwen shook her head again, laughed, deprecated.... Impossible to assert that she was offended at his homage, even from the wrong young man. She listened as the guileless Brown went on to tell her it was a very lucky man for whom she'd be making a little home, some day; and, by Jove, anybody might envy him——
"Very nice of you to say so," murmured Olwen, pink-eared, and ardently wishing that Captain Ross had stayed on to hear this declaration.
The next remark of Mr. Brown's seemed to have nothing to do with it.
"Well, the War can't go on for ever."
"No, I suppose not," said Olwen, uncertainly.
"And I suppose——Well, it oughtn't to be quite as hard for a chap to get some sort of a posish of his own afterwards," said little Mr. Brown, thoughtfully, and as if he were already looking ahead, to a time when he should no longer wear that uniform, that belt that he was fastening as he came and stood nearer to the girl, looking down.
"I mean to say, I'm not going back to any stuffy shop and serving a lot of old trout—I beg their pardons—ladies with two and a half yards of écru insertion, pay at the desk, please. Not much. 'Tisn't the life for me; I know it now. They ought to find something different for me, after this. They've got to. Don't you think so?"
"Oh yes," agreed Olwen, a little vaguely.
"Well! There you are! All sorts of things might happen, with luck, even if it's no good planning 'em out now," took up the cheery boyish voice; and then there was silence for a moment under the pines.
Then lowering the voice, he said: "I say, I'll tell you something. That little mascot I found"—he touched his coat—"that you tucked in there for me, I'll always keep that. Nobody else shall touch it, you bet."