“Women are lame ducks on the war game,” he admitted. “Look-a-here,” he added. “I might as well tell you: I’m goin’ to Europe to get into the fight.”
“On purpose?” she asked, incredulously.
He nodded. “It’s the only man’s job on the place just now,” he told her. “Everybody else is just hangin’ round, lookin’ on. I want to be in on it.”
She stood very still, and in the half light her face seemed white and suddenly tired.
“Why don’t you ask which side?” he prompted her.
“I don’t care which side,” she answered, and walked back toward the end of the platform.
He kept beside her, curiously beset by the need to follow his spectacular announcement with some explanation. And abruptly he thought that he understood her attitude.
“I s’pose,” he said, shamefacedly, “you’re thinkin’ I won’t be much of a soldier if I behave as I did last night.”
“Oh no,” she said, “I don’t see as it matters much whether they’re shot drunk or shot sober.”
While he was groping at this, she added: