"And now you want to enlist?"
"If I can, sir."
"What as?"
"Anything, sir. For the front, if it is possible. I want to be at it."
The Captain smiled at Bob's eagerness.
"But, my dear chap," he said, "this is surely a big change for you. If I remember aright, you joined the O.T.C. only to please your mother, and you hated soldiering and all its doings as you hated the devil."
"I expect I do still, sir; but—but I am afraid it would take too long to explain why—why I feel I must go to the front. I've had a bad time in one way and another. You see, my father was a Quaker, and I was brought up to believe in his teachings. I do still, for that matter. War is hell, there's no doubt about that. But I've gone through the whole business, and now I want to be at it. I don't want to stay in England five minutes longer than I can help. I must get to the firing-line. I feel like a man who wants to kill a mad dog."
"Commissions aren't so easily obtained."
"I'm not troubling about a commission, sir. We can't be all officers, and I feel that all I ever learnt about soldiering would come back to me in a week. If I can help it, I don't want to be idling around in a barracks, or in camp; I just want to go to France as soon as ever I can. I'll do anything, be anything; I don't care what, so long as I can get into action."
"That's the spirit," replied Captain Pringle; "and I can't tell you how glad I am to see you here. Of course I remember you when you were in the O.T.C. You did jolly well—distinguished yourself, in fact. You remember what I said to you."