Page:Adams - A Child of the Age.djvu/45

Rh from him if I could not To leave my post!' (Smiling again. Then, after a moment's rest:) ' I remember it so well! I can hear his voice now.

"Where-ever any man shall take his place, either because he has thought it better that he should be there, or because his captain has put him there—there, as it seems to me, should he remain to face the danger, and take no account of death or of anything else in comparison with disgrace!"—And my captain is God,' he said. And with that he bent forward a little with a faint light in his face and round his lips as of a bright smile that seemed to grow deeper and deeper in a dim dream that lacked not sweetness. I sat for a time watching him; till I too grew into a dream, a dim one, but it had no forms or shapes nor any sweetness.

Suddenly I started up and out of it. Looking at him, and perceiving no gap in our talk:

'Who says that?' I said.

He answered slowly as if unaware of me:

'Plato makes Sokrates say it But I was thinking of a particular occasion.'

The door was unlatched: opened, and Mother McCarthy put in her head, to say that the doctor had come up to say good-bye and shake hands with Mr. Clayton.

'It's very good of him!' cried Clayton, jumping up. 'Isn't he afraid? Although,' he added, turning back a little to me from half-way down the room, 'there's not much fear of us two, anyway. I'll be back in a sec.!'

He nodded: turned, and went out. The door closed: up went the latch: fell: steps crossed the planks: another door opened, and closed. Silence.

I sat thinking vaguely about what he had been saying: vaguely, till my eyelids began to droop, and head to nod, and at last I must have fallen fast asleep.

I woke up with a start. The fire was almost out. I was full of sleep: got off my things somehow: dropped into bed, the cool clean sheets: into sleep again, and slept soundly till morning.

Mother McCarthy woke me bringing in breakfast. The gold sunshine was pouring through the window. Her tongue was stirring already.—Mr. Clayton came in