“No, no, of course not. Come with me and pick his out of the pile, and you can take them home.”
“Thank you, Mus’ Archie.”
He followed young Lamb into a little gun-room opening on the hall, and was able to pick out Harry’s rather bobtail toilet from a muddle of Sinden and Pix raiment.
“That’s all, is it? Wan’t anything to wrap ’em in?”
“No, sir, it aun’t worth it. Thank you kindly for letting me have the things.”
“There was never any question of you not having them. I’ve no right to keep ’em. So you’re joining up to-morrow?”
He was in uniform, but without his belt. Somehow to Tom he seemed a burlier, browner man than the young squire whom before the war he used to see out hunting, or shooting, or driving girls in his car.
“Yes, I’m joining up, as they say.”
“You don’t seem over-pleased about it.”