"Why? Yes, I'll tell you," he said with a reckless laugh. "I'll tell you why I wear a new name. It's because I love my old one—and the mother who bore it—and from whom I received it! And it's because I won't risk disgracing it. You have asked, and that's why! Because—I'm afraid in battle!—if you want to know!—afraid of getting hurt—wounded—killed! I don't know what I might do; I don't know! And if the world ever sees Private Ormond running away, they'll never know it was Constance Berkley's son. And that's why I changed my name!"
"W-what?" she faltered. Then, revolted. "It is not true! You are not afraid!"
"I tell you I am," he repeated with a mirthless laugh. "Don't you suppose I ought to know? I want to get out of bullet range every time I'm shot at. And—if anybody ever turns coward, I prefer that it should be trooper Ormond, not trooper Berkley. And that is the truth, Ailsa."
She was scarcely able to suppress her anger now. She looked at him, flushed, excited, furious.
"Why do you say such untruthful things to me! Who was it that fairly kicked his fellow troopers into charging infantry with nothing but lances against bullets?"
Amazed for a second, he burst into an abrupt laugh that rang harshly in the room.
"Who told you such cock-and-bull stories, Ailsa?"
"Didn't you do it? Isn't it true?"
"Do what? Do what the Government pays me for doing? Yes, I happened to come up to the scratch that time. But I was scared, every inch of me—if you really want the truth."
"But—you did it?"