“I lost all, except my life—and I wish to God I’d lost that,” he replied, gloomily.
“Oh, don’t talk so!” implored Carley in distress. “Forgive me, Rust, if I hurt you. But I must tell you—that—that Glenn wrote me—you’d lost your girl. Oh, I’m sorry! It is dreadful for you now. But if you got well—and went to work—and took up life where you left it—why soon your pain would grow easier. And you’d find some happiness yet.”
“Never for me in this world.”
“But why, Rust, why? You’re no—no—Oh! I mean you have intelligence and courage. Why isn’t there anything left for you?”
“Because something here’s been killed,” he replied, and put his hand to his heart.
“Your faith? Your love of—of everything? Did the war kill it?”
“I’d gotten over that, maybe,” he said, drearily, with his somber eyes on space that seemed lettered for him. “But she half murdered it—and they did the rest.”
“They? Whom do you mean, Rust?”
“Why, Carley, I mean the people I lost my leg for!” he replied, with terrible softness.
“The British? The French?” she queried, in bewilderment.