Then there was an awkward pause.
"Good-bye, Tom," said Rachel, extending her hand. "Won't you come over and see us sometime?"
"I'm generally too tired when night comes. Good-bye, Rachel"; and he took her hand in a friendly way. But this was one of those farewells that are aggravated by mental contrast, and Rachel felt, as she looked at Tom's serious and preoccupied face, that it was to her the end of a chapter.
Tom started up the pathway toward the house, but stopped half-way and plucked a ripe seed-pod from the top of a poppy-stalk, and rubbed it out between his two hands as he looked a little regretfully after Rachel until she disappeared over the hill. Then he turned and saw Barbara standing on the porch regarding him inquiringly.
"You aren't like yourself any more, Tom," she said.
"I know that," he answered, meditatively, at the same time filliping the minute poppy-seeds away, half a dozen at a time, with his thumb. "I don't seem to be the same fellow that I was three months ago. Then I'd 'a' followed Rachel like a dog every step of the way home."
"She's awfully in love with you, poor girl."
"Oh! she'll get over that, I suppose. She's been in love before."
"And you don't care for her any more?"
"I don't seem to care for anything that I used to care for. I wouldn't like to be what I used to be."