"How is it, Roland, that you never say 'darling'? I don't think I've ever heard you say it in your life, any more than I've ever heard you talk slang."
"I don't know. I don't want to say it, somehow. You know, you yourself say it's cheap."
"It's cheap when a woman says it, because women generally say it too easily; but it can be a grand word when a man speaks it—or a boy. Still, I am quite satisfied that you should call me just Big Yeogh Wough. I know I am dearer to you than anyone else in the world can ever be—at least, until you grow up and fall in love."
I had spoken with a laugh, but he answered me gravely.
"I shall have to find a very special sort of girl before I leave you for her."
A few minutes later, when I had risen from beside his bed and was opening his window, he said:
"Did you see those Territorials coming along just as we turned in at the gate here? Did you see how well they marched? Of course, they were only Territorials and people always laugh at them, but there's something so splendid in the sound of marching feet that I can't get it out of my head. It made me feel for the first time almost sorry that I'm never going to be a soldier."
Oh, that splendid sound of marching feet, so grand, so gay, and yet so heartbreaking! He was to hear it often enough in a very few years to come!