There was only a trifle more of hesitation before the boy answered: “Well—I’ll come.”
Ogden slapped him on the back and he moved off with long, deliberate strides. The older man looked after him. The boy’s splendid build and the grace with which his head was set on those firm shoulders attracted many a glance wherever he appeared.
The man sighed. He was familiar with the type of disillusioned returned members of the A.E.F., who went out surrounded by the incense of hero-worship, and came back to the shock of finding themselves negligible.
CHAPTER II
FOR CAROL
At the appointed hour Hugh came. He had made the concession of blacking his shoes, and shaving, and the unkempt hair of the noon hour, though obviously still in need of the barber, had been brushed until its dark auburn waves lay thickly in place.
John Ogden had secured a table for two in a retired corner and ordered a dinner, the first couple of courses of which seemed to cheer the gloom of his guest.
“I suppose I ought to call you Major,” said the boy.
“Not if it does violence to your feelings. I am plain John Ogden again, you know. I would like to forget the war.”