"What should you give yours for that, eh?"
"It isn't so much your English, as your slang, that I wonder at, de Konski. Where on earth did you get it?" the young man asked.
"In England probably. Yes, I have spent some time in England. Do you know, Paul, I used to see a good deal of your mother at one time, and I have never lost touch with her."
"Ah, she didn't teach you slang," he reflected, wondering if the man had been an old flame of his mother's. That he was for some good reason passing under an assumed name he knew; that he was on intimate terms with people of his acquaintance, and conversant with all his family affairs, he was well aware, else he knew only that the man had befriended and helped him as a friend of his cousin's.
"And I know more about her now than you do, perhaps, for I know what is breaking her heart," the elder man added.
"Oh, hearts don't break so easily. But I know what will cut her up awfully when she hears it," the youth said, jamming his hat sullenly over his eyes. "But—well, my sisters will look after her. They'll make her happy. As for me—well, it must be the ranks, or the Colonies—or the first opportunity of being washed overboard—taken with cramp, swimming. No other way. I did think of the sea—or a shot—this morning. But—she mustn't think it's on purpose. She——"
"Come, come," remonstrated the elder man, laying a hand on his shoulder. "Let's hear all about it. It's a rare thing that is past mending."
"No mending for me. Played out, and done for at last. What you—you said—though you were a beast to say it—is true. Good for nothing—best out of the way."
On this road, that was sheltered from the sharp breeze by the cliff, it was hot. A glimpse of snow-peak up a gorge far inland was refreshing, and yonder, on the left across a wooded ravine, came the blue glow of the sea from the other side by unseen Villafranca behind the hill, whence warships were steaming slowly.
The elder man sat down on a rock by the road, and observed all this beauty of sunny sea and green mountain slope and far-vistaed gorge. The other saw nothing. He stood with his face turned from his companion, who observed a slight quiver in the square shoulder towards him; then the young man suddenly flung himself face downwards on the grassy bank by his side, while the bearded man lit a pipe and smoked thoughtfully for some seconds, till the faint convulsive motion of the shoulders had stopped.