Echoes of the War

by J. M. Barrie

BILLY. 'I hoped you would say that.'

BARBARA. 'But, Billy, I'm to have such a dream of a wedding gown. Granny is going with me to London, to choose it'—laying her head on the Colonel's shoulder—'if you can do without her for a day, dear.'

COLONEL, gallantly, 'I shall go with you, I couldn't trust you and granny to choose the gown.'

KARL. 'You must often be pretty lonely, sir, when we are all out and about enjoying ourselves.'

COLONEL. 'They all say that. But that is the time when I'm not lonely, Karl. It's then I see things most clearly—the past, I suppose. It all comes crowding back to me—India, the Crimea, India again—and it's so real, especially the people. They come and talk to me. I seem to see them; I don't know they haven't been here, Billy, till your granny tells me afterwards.'

BILLY. 'Yes, I know, I wonder where granny is.'

BARBARA. 'It isn't often she leaves you for so long, dear.'

COLONEL. 'She told me she had to go out, but I forget where. Oh, yes, she has gone down to the village to a wedding.'

BILLY. 'A wedding?'

BARBARA. 'It's curious how he harps on that.'