"About what, Mr. Thorold?"
"Well—if you will excuse me—about you," he said, with a very pleasant look, frank and soft at once.
"I am quite ready to explain myself. But I am afraid, when I have done it, that you will not understand me, Mr. Thorold."
"Think I cannot?" said he.
"I am afraid not—without knowing what I know."
"Let us see," said Thorold. "I want to know why you judge so differently from other people about the right and the wrong of hops and such things. Somebody is mistaken—that is clear."
"But the difficulty is, I cannot give you my point of view."
"Please try," said Thorold, contentedly.
"Mr. Thorold, I told you, I am a soldier."
"Yes," he said, looking up at me, and little sparkles of light seeming to come out of his hazel eyes.