THE FACE
All the next day that face haunted Roscoe. "If I could only know where he is," he said to himself; "if I could bring him back, I'd tell the whole business."
It occurred to him that perhaps Tom was dead and that that was why he was continually seeing that stolid face with the bloody scar. "Maybe the cut got worse and he got blood poisoning and died," he thought.
This train of thought possessed him so that he grew to believe that Tom Slade must really be dead. And that being the case, there would be no use in telling anybody anything....
At breakfast he seemed so preoccupied that after he left the room his mother said to his father,
"You don't think he's nervous or timid, do you?"
"I think he's a little nervous about making a speech in public," said Mr. Bent. "He isn't afraid of anything else," he added proudly.
During the morning Mrs. Bent wanted to take his picture. "You look so splendid and handsome in your uniform, dear!" she told him. So he stood in the big bay window where the sunlight streamed in and let her snap the camera at him. He did look splendid and handsome, there was no denying that.
Then she would have him develop the film with his own hands so that she could make some prints right away. "You may not have another leave," she said. "It's dreadful that you have to go back to camp late to-night."
"Don't you care," he laughed, in that companionable way in which he always talked with his mother.