“The beginning, but not the end of you. Your eyes are fine, too. They keep me wondering all the time what colour they really are.” “That’s very nice of you.” “And the way you carry yourself!” 62 62 “Good gracious!” “You look as if you had come down from Olympus and had lost the way back.” “Captain, you’re a dear! I’ve just been wild to have a man say foolish things to me.” She knew that she might play with this man; that he would never venture across the line. “Men have said foolish things to me, but always when I was too busy to bother. To-night I haven’t anything in this wide world to do but listen. Go on.” He laughed, perhaps a little ruefully. “Is there any fire in you, I wonder?” “Well?”—tantalizing. “Honestly, I should like to see you in a rage. I’ve been watching you for weeks, and have found myself irritated by that perpetual calm of yours. That day of the riot you stood on the curb as unconcerned as though you had been witnessing a movie.” “It is possible that it is the result of seeing so much pain and misery. I have been a machine too long. I want to be thrust into the middle of some fairy story before I die. I have never been in love, in a violent rage. I haven’t known anything but work and an abiding discontent. Red hair——” “But it really isn’t red. It’s like the copper beech in the sunshine, full of glowing embers.” 63 63 “Are you a poet?” “On my word, I don’t know what I am.” “There is fire enough in you. The way you tossed about our boys and the Japs!”
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