“No, no; not to-day. Let us go home.”
“As you please, dear”; and they slid away swiftly down the gleaming water as the evening shadows crept across the stream.
After awhile Rose said, looking up, “You must have seen, oh, so many people die, Pardy.”
“Yes; Death was for four years a constant comrade. I had always a firm belief I would not be killed. Some men were always predicting their own deaths; others carefully avoided the question. I know one very gallant fellow who was always a gay comrade in camp, and almost abnormally merry in battle unless the fight took place on a day of the month which was an odd number. Then he was sure to think he would be killed. Men in war are like gamblers, and have queer notions as to luck. You knew that child was dying?”
“Yes.”
“How did you know it?”
“I cannot tell. What troubled me, Pardy, was—I think what troubled me—was the loneliness of death; that little fellow going away and away, all by himself.”
“Yes, dear.
‘Once, once only, love must drop the hand of love!’”
“But what a horrible woman! I can’t help thinking that.”