"Can't say I have, Shorty." His tone was humble; gone was the pathetic arrogance that had been the pride of Mogg's; in its place the beginnings of the realisation of his utter futility had come, coupled with a profound hero worship for the man who had condescended to notice him. "When are you going to teach me that sniping game?"
The real sniping commander of the battalion—I mean no disrespect to the worthy young officer who officially filled that position—looked at the eager face opposite him and laughed.
"You'd better quit it, son. Why, to start with, you're frightened of the dark."
"I'm damned if I am." The aggrieved Percy waxed indignant.
"Oh, cut it out! I don't mean you're frightened of going to bed in the dark, or that you want a nightlight or a nurse. But yours is a town dark: standing under lamps gettin' the glad from a passing skirt. But in the real dark, when it's pressing round you like a blanket, and there are things moving, and people breathing near by, and you don't know whether it's a German or a pal, or where the wire is, or which way your own trenches are—what then, son, what then? Why, I reckon you don't even know which the Pole Star is, or what it's there for?"
"I guess not, Shorty," remarked the other, abashed; "but I'd soon learn, if you'd teach me."
"Well, I'll see. An' there's that blamed old woman with a face like a wet street tryin' to shut up the shop. Give me another, mother darling; no good your na-poohing me—I'm going to have it if I takes it."
Being what he was he got it, and that evening the lessons began. Going back to their billet, they had to cross a field. It was a pitch-black night, and before they had proceeded twenty yards Reggie could hardly see his hand in front of his face.
"Dark, Shorty, ain't it?" he remarked.
There was no answer, and he stopped and repeated the question. Still no answer, though he seemed to feel some one close by. Something brushed his face, and then silence. With a short laugh he walked on—a laugh which had just the faintest touch of bravado in it. Four times in the distance to the billet did that something brush his face again, and though each time he felt that there was some one near him, yet he heard nothing. The fourth time he stopped and spoke.