He reached out his hand and took hers. “Am I worth it, Peggy?”
Her lips twitched and tears stood in her eyes.
“I don’t know what you mean?”
“Neither do I quite,” he replied simply. “But it seems that I’m a Tommy through and through, and that I’ll never get Tommy out of my soul.”
“That’s nothing to be ashamed of,” she declared stoutly.
“Of course not. But it makes one see all sorts of things in a different light.”
“Oh, don’t worry your head about that,” she said, with pathetic misunderstanding. “We’ll put you all right as soon as we get you back to Durdlebury. I suppose you won’t refuse to come this time.”
“Yes, I’ll come this time,” said Doggie.
So he promised, and the talk drifted on to casual lines. She gave him the mild chronicle of the sleepy town, described plays which she had seen on her rare visits to London, sketched out a programme for his all too short visit to the Deanery.
“And in the meanwhile,” she remarked, “try to get these morbid ideas out of your silly old head.”