“And what sort of a world do you suppose it will be, after the war, for men who haven’t fought in the war? The others will talk and remember—and I’ll be shut outside their talk and memories. They’ll have suffered, and lost their pals, and helped their pals through with it—I shall have suffered nothing and lost nothing and helped no one. I—oh, I was kept safe ... in cold storage! God! the meanest little whelp of a Servian or Bulgarian, German, Turk, or Belgian—it doesn’t matter what side, when you’re in the scrum, heart and soul—he will have taken a risk denied to me. I’m funking life after the war, worse even than to-day and to-morrow and next week—and next Autumn. Didn’t know I was a funk, did you, Deb?”
She asked slowly: “Will it really do you any good, if I marry Samson Phillips?”
And Richard got up, frowning. “No. What makes you ask that?”
“You said—when you came in——”
“Did I?” he muttered. “I didn’t know—didn’t mean to. I’m all in bits; don’t take any notice.” He dug his hands into his pockets, and walked away to the window.
It was significant that he growled out no apologies for having cried. That he should be capable of such a thing was accepted, wearily, with the other horrors.
Queer how the very bend of his neck made his sister feel sore with tenderness ... she must help him butt through his bad hour. And she reproached herself for neglecting him all this while—Richard, whom she loved better than any other.
“Is Samson in England again?”
“Yes. In hospital. Trench feet. David told me. Said that Uncle Otto still wants him for Nell. Somebody English in the family, to grab on to.”