“Yes, Punch; you are quite right. But look here. Suppose I was lying here wounded, would you go off and leave me at night on this cold mountain-side, knowing how those brutes of wolves hang about the rear of the army? You have heard them of a night, haven’t you?”
“Yes,” said the boy, shudderingly drawing his breath through his tightly closed teeth. “I say, comrade, what do you want to talk like that for?”
“Because I want you to answer my question: Would you go off and leave me here alone?”
“No, I’m blessed if I would,” said the boy, speaking now in a voice full of animation. “I couldn’t do it, comrade, and it wouldn’t be like a soldier’s son.”
“But I am not a soldier’s son, Punch.”
“No,” said the boy, “and that’s what our lads say. They don’t like you, and they say— There, I won’t tell you what.”
“Yes, tell me, Punch. I should like to know.”
“They say that they have not got anything else against you, only you have no business here in the ranks.”
“Why do they say that?”
“Because, when they are talking about it, they say you are a gentleman and a scholard.”