Troy! Troy! After all, Troy would remember him. Though he knew it
brought him nearer to freedom, all that marching through France had
been a weariness eating into his soul. Now a free man, along the
road from Plymouth to Troy he had almost skipped.
And this had been his homecoming!
They remembered him. Beyond all his hopes they remembered him.
In their memory he had grown into a Homeric man, a demi-god. He had
only to declare himself. . . .
The Major lay on his hospital bed and stared at the ceiling. It was
all very well, but ten years had made a difference--a mighty
difference; a difference which beat all his calculations. It was a
double difference, too; for all the while that he had been shrinking
in self-knowledge, his reputation at home had been expanding like a
cucumber.
Good Lord! How could he live up to it now? To obey his impulses and
declare himself was simple enough, perhaps; but afterwards--
He had nearly betrayed himself when Cai Tamblyn--in a queer
straight-cut frock-coat of livery, blue with brass buttons, but
otherwise looking much the same as ever--thrust his head in at the
door.
In the first shock of astonishment the Major had almost cried out on
him by name.
"Why--eh?--what are _you_ doing here?" he stammered. Hitherto he had
been waited on by a strange doctor (Hansombody's new partner) and a
nurse whom he had assisted twelve years ago, when she was left a
widow, to set up as a midwife.
Pages:
235
236
237
238
239
240
241
242
243
244
245
246
247
248
249
250
251
252
253
254
255
256
257
258
259