"Good-night?. . . .
. . . .
Let us remain together still,
Then it will be GOOD night."
SHELLEY.
Ben Kelham sat on the ground, with his head resting on the edge of the wooden couch so that his friend's satin coat touched his cheek.
Save for his hands clenched round his knee there was no sign of the grief which was well-nigh breaking his heart; which had drawn great lines across his face and had turned him in one hour from a youth, into a grave man, with steady, sorrowful grey eyes.
There was no sound as he sat staring in front of him as the light of the lamp grew dim in the coming light of day, there was no movement anywhere save for the chequered curtain behind his friend, which stirred as though blown by the wind of dawn; they seemed to be alone, quite alone in the desert, these two who had been known as David and Jonathan in the care-free days on the Hill.
And he turned his head and looked at the wonderful beauty of the calm face, and in the soft light it seemed that the brown eyes were looking at him from under half-closed lids, and he stretched out his hand and laid it on the arms which were folded across the breast in an attitude of surpassing dignity.
"Carden, old fellow," he said, "wake up!"
As his friend slept on, he spoke more clearly, repeating the line out of the school-song, which had acted like a charm in those days when love, and pain, and death had been mere words to them:
"Carden," he called, "Carden, 'it's a quarter to seven, there goes the bell!'"
And when there came no answer he turned and buried his head on his arms.