“Do you think so?” said Barry. “Then I'll be there.”
“Good man,” said Major Bayne, patting him on the shoulder. “That's the stuff we like in this battalion.”
Barry found his hut in order, his things out for airing, his tub ready, and supper in preparation.
“Thanks, Monroe,” he said to Major Bayne's batman, as he passed into his hut.
As he entered his hut and closed the door, for the first time there swept over his soul an appalling and desolating sense of loneliness. It was his first moment of quiet, his first leisure to think of himself for almost two weeks. With the loss of his batman there had been snapped the last link with that old home life of his, now so remote but all the dearer for that. It came to him that while he remained a soldier, this was to be his continual experience. Upon his return from every tour new gaps would stare at him. Up in the lines they did not so terribly obtrude themselves, but back here in rest billets they thrust themselves upon him like hideous mutilations upon a well loved face. He could hardly force himself to remove his muddy, filthy clothes. He would gladly have laid himself down upon his cot just as he was, and given himself up to the luxury of his grief and loneliness, until sleep should come, but his life as a soldier had taught him something. These months of discipline, and especially these last months of companionship with his battalion through the terrible experiences of war, had wrought into the very fibre of his life a sense of unity with and responsibility for his comrades. His every emotion of loss, of grief, of heart-sickness carried with it the immediate suggestion and remembrance that his comrades too were passing through a like experience, and this was his salvation. Weary, sick, desolate as he felt himself in this hour, he remembered that many of his comrades were as he, weary, and sick and desolate. He wondered how the major's batman felt.
“Well, Monroe,” he said with an attempt at a voice of cheer, “pretty tough go this time.”
“Yes, sir, very tough,” said Monroe. “I lost my chum this time,” he added after a few moments' silence.
“Poor chap,” said Barry. “I'm awfully sorry for you. It's hard to leave a friend up there.”
“It is that, sir,” replied Monroe, and then he added hurriedly but with hesitation, “and if you will pardon me, sir, we all know it's awful tough for you. The boys all feel for you, sir, believe me.”
The unexpected touch of sympathy was too much for Barry's self-control. A rush of warm tears came to his eyes and choked his voice. For some minutes he busied himself with his undressing, but Monroe continued speaking.