"So am I," Norine feelingly declared. "I think I understand how you feel and I can't blame you for wanting to live, now that you've learned what a splendid thing life is."
"If O'Reilly had been with me I think I could have managed, somehow, for he would have understood, too. I—I'll never go back to the front, alone—they can shoot me, if they want to. Have you heard anything from him?"
"Not a word. Cuba swallowed him up. Oh, Leslie, it is a cruel country!
It is taking the best and the youngest. I—want to go away."
He smiled mirthlessly. "I'm fed up on it, too. I want to be where I can shave when I need to and wear something besides canvas pajamas. I'm cured of war; I want a policeman to stop the traffic and help me across the street. I want to put my feet under a breakfast-table, rustle a morning paper, and slap an egg in the face. That's all the excitement I hunger for."
Norine filled a basin with clean water and, taking a fresh bandage, wrapped up the self-inflicted hurt, Branch watching her anxiously. Now and again he flinched like a child when she touched his wound. At last he inquired, apprehensively, "Is it infected?"
"No."
"Lord! I'm glad! Wouldn't it be just my luck to get blood poisoning?"
Norine surprised her patient by inquiring, irrelevantly, "Leslie, is there anybody here who can marry people?"
"Eh? Why, of course!" Then suddenly his somber face lightened and he cried: "NORINE! DO YOU MEAN IT?"
"Not you. I wouldn't marry you."