Meanwhile the growing excitement of the war, heightened and poisoned by this reaction of his personality, combined with his painful efforts to recover his business to make him for a time more pale and gaunt than ever. Ancrum remonstrated in vain. He would go his way.
One evening—it was the day after Worth—he was striding blindly up the Oxford Road when he ran against a man at the corner of a side street. It was Barbier, coming out for the last news.
Barbier started, swore, caught him by the arm, then fell back in amazement.
'C'est toi? bon Dieu!'
David, who had hitherto avoided his old companion with the utmost ingenuity, began hurriedly to inquire whether he was going to look at the evening's telegram.
'Yes—no—what matter? You can tell me. David, my lad, Ancrum told me you had been ill, but—'
The old man slipped his arm through that of the youth and looked at him fixedly. His own face was all furrowed and drawn, the eyes red.
'Oui; tu es change,' he said at last with a sudden quivering breath, almost a sob, 'like everything,—like the world!'
And hanging down his head he drew the lad on, down the little street, towards his lodging.
'Come in! I'll ask no questions. Oh, come in! I have the French papers; for three hours I have been reading them alone. Come in or I shall go mad!'