slowly to his feet and buttoned up his monkey jacket.
“You goin’, Bill?” asked his neighbour in a low voice.
The upright figure nodded. “He’d have done as much for me,” he replied, and walked quickly out of the room.
No one spoke for some minutes. Then the youngest member lowered the magazine he was holding in front of him.
“Do they cry?” he asked.
“No,” said two voices simultaneously. “’Least,” added one, “not at the time.{81}”
’
{81}
The silence settled down again like dust that had been disturbed; then the first speaker leaned forward and tapped the ashes out of his pipe.
“Well,” he observed, “they didn’t get him cheap, at all events. I’m open to a bet that he sent a Boche or two ahead of him to pipe the side.”
The group nodded a grim assent.
“Yes,” said one who had not hitherto spoken. “I reckon you’re right. But we shan’t hear till the war’s over. They know how to keep their own secrets.” He puffed at his pipe reflectively.
“Anyhow, thank God I’m a bachelor,” he concluded. He lifted a fox-terrier’s head between his hands and shook it gently to and fro. “No one need go and tell our wives if we don’t come back—eh, little Blinks?” The dog yawned, gave the hands that held him a perfunctory lick, and resumed his interrupted nap sprawling across his master’s knees.
. . . . .
Among the letters intercepted shortly afterwards on their way to a South American State from Germany was one that contained the following significant passage:
{82}
{82}
“ ... Yesterday all Kiel was beflagged: we were to have had a half-holiday on the occasion of the trials of the great new battle cruiser——. Owing to an unforeseen incident, however, the trials were not completed. Our half-holiday has been postponed indefinitely....”
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