“It does want a pretty strong arm,” said Aleck, “and I don’t know that it’s quite equal to sailing, after all;” and then he went off into a long discourse about boats and yachts and rigging, that was rather bewildering to Creepy; but it was so pleasant to hear it for all that, that he almost forgot everything else, and the battle of the day before went clear out of sight. But it all rose up again when Aleck said he was afraid he was staying too long, and then returned to the subject of Creepy’s visits.
“You’ll come and let Nelly see you again the first day you’re well enough, wont you?”
The hot flush came up once more, and Creepy shrank back among the pillows, as he had when the doctor had asked him to see Aleck, and for a moment the enemy had the upper-hand again.
“Oh, I can’t! I can’t let her see me, and I don’t want ever to look at her again; she is too beautiful!”
“And don’t you like beautiful things?” asked Aleck, though fearing that he understood only too well.
“Yes; but if she should look at me! If she should say ‘Humpy!’ She would think it, if she didn’t say the words, and I couldn’t bear it.”
There! he had done the very thing he had thought would kill him if Aleck did it!
In a moment Aleck was on his knee before Creepy’s corner, and had one arm placed gently and tenderly about his neck.
“Are you thinking of that still?” he said. “Haven’t you got those miserable words out of your head yet? If you only knew how the boys are always saying such things to each other, and how nobody ever minds it or thinks of it again. It’s a horrid way they have, and they ought to have seen that you weren’t used to roughing it; they’ve been sorry enough since, but if you only knew how they never gave a thought to what they were saying, you might forget it.”
“But they told the truth,” said Creepy, looking drearily at Aleck; “they called me Humpy, and said, ‘What is a fellow like him going to do?’ and it was true! No, I can’t forget it, but I can bear it; the doctor says I must, to be a good soldier, but I shall always know it is true.”