"But hell, Red, you haven't any home—any place to go," blurted out Maynard.
So they argued with him, and implored him, and reasoned with him. Since his discharge from the hospital in France Payson had always been cool, weary, abstracted, difficult to reach. And here at the last he grew strangely aloof and stubborn. Every word that bore relation to his own welfare seemed only to alienate him the more. Lane sensed this.
"See here, Red," he said, "hasn't it occurred to you that Blair and I need you?"
"Need me? What!" he exclaimed, with perceptible change of tone, though it was incredulous.
"Sure," interposed Blair.
"Red—listen," continued Lane, speaking low and with difficulty. "Blair and I have been through the—the whole show together.... And we've been in the hospitals with you for months.... We've all got—sort of to rely on each other.... Let's stick it out to the end. I guess—you know—we may not have a long time...."
Lane's voice trailed off. Then the stony face of the listener changed for a fleeting second.
"Boys, I'll go over with you," he said.
And then the maimed Blair, awkward with his crutch and bag, insisted on helping Lane get Red aboard the train. Red could just about walk. Sombrely they clambered up the steps into the Pullman.
Middleville was a prosperous and thriving inland town of twenty thousand inhabitants, identical with many towns of about the same size in the middle and eastern United States.