“I’ve a strange feeling, lately, that dear old Dick is near. Sometimes, as I wake up, I seem to remember vaguely having seen him in my dreams. It’s as if his features were just fading from view.”
He paused here so long that I made another attempt to take advantage of his abstraction.
By an effort of the will that it is difficult to explain, I guided his hand into the formation of the words:
“With a jugful of kisses for Winkie, as ever her....”
Just then, Louis looked down.
“Good God!” he exclaimed, as if he had seen a ghost.
IV.
“WINKIE” was a pet name I had given Velma when we were children together.
Louis always maintained there was no sense in it, and refused to adopt it, though I frequently called her by the name in later years. And of his own volition, Louis would never have mentioned anything so convivial as a jugful of kisses.
So, through the weary months before he was invalided home, I worked. When he left France at the debarkation point, he still walked on crutches, but with the promise of regaining the unassisted use of his leg before very long. Throughout the voyage, I hovered near him, sharing his impatience, his longing for the one we both held dearest.