"
"Don't you now?"
"Not always. I've had plenty of time to get tired of being grown up."
"Maybe you've been a soldier, and have seen sad things," she suggested.
"I was thinking when I first saw you, that you looked like a soldier."
"I wish I had been. Unfortunately I was too disgustingly young, when our
only war of my day was on. I mean, the sort of war one could volunteer
for."
"In South Africa?"
"Yes. You were a baby in that remote time."
"Oh no, I wasn't. I'm eighteen now, going on nineteen. I was in Paris
then, with my stepmother and my sister. We used to hear talk about the
war, though we knew hardly any English people."
"So Paris won't be a new experience to you?" said Stephen, disappointed
that he had been mistaken in all his surmises.
"I went back to America before I was nine, and I've been there ever
since, till a few weeks ago. Oh see, there are the lights of France! I
can't help being excited."
"Yes, we'll be in very soon--in about ten minutes."
"I am glad! I'd better go below and make my hair tidy. Thank you ever so
much for helping me to be comfortable."
She jumped up, unrolled herself, and began to fold the rug neatly.
Stephen would have taken it from her and bundled it together anyhow, but
she would not let him do that. "I like folded things," she said. "It's
nice to see them come straight, and I enjoy it more because the wind
doesn't want me to do it. To succeed in spite of something, is a kind of
little triumph--and seems like a sign.
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