"William Saint doing so well and cutting into your business worried her dreadful. I think it worries her still that you takes it so easy."
Alfred meditated upon this. When he answered her, he conveyed to her mind an extraordinary sense of detachment, as if he, the strong man, so enterprising as a carrier, so alert for "orders," had become suddenly an onlooker at the game of life. Perhaps surroundings lent themselves to this impression. They had climbed slowly to the high downs, and were standing near a noted landmark, a small tower known as the Pepper Box. A sharp frost had silvered the downs. The air was very still. Upon each side of them stretched the uplands, melting into distant woods. No animals were to be seen, not a sheep, not a bird. They seemed to stand alone in a beautiful, deserted world.
"I suppose," he said, "that 'tis like this. Before the war, I might have felt different towards William Saint. And after the war, Fancy, if I'm here, I shall try hard to get back my own again. But to-day I'm thinking of peace. Fed-up with war I am. I want to live quiet with you and Mother. I talked a lot of foolishness once about making big money. You didn't cotton much to the notion. Maybe you feared it would take me away from you?"
"I did."
"Well, maybe it would. Money drives some folks apart, and the want of it brings 'em together. And, out there, plotting and planning seems silly, because one may be—'next.'"
She clutched his arm. He smiled at her, continuing slowly:
"'Tain't so terrible a thought. Most of us fears pain more'n death. I see more frightened folks in Nether-Applewhite than in the dug outs. Queer thoughts have come to me, my maid, since we two parted."
"Tell them to me, Alfie."
"'Tisn't easy unless a man has the gift of words. Times, especially at night, when an attack is expected I've lain still as a dormouse, thinking that 'twas unreal, a dream like, and that soon I should wake up and find myself somewhere else."
"I often feel just that way."