"Indeed! Well, two years of beggary, to say nothing of eight months of war,
isn't just the thing to insure immortal youth, is it? You see, I'm turning
gray."
The pallor of the long march was in his face, giving him a striking though
unnatural beauty. His eyes were heavy and his hair hung dishevelled about
his brow, but the change went deeper still, and the girl saw it. "You're
bigger--that's it," she said, and added impulsively, "Oh, how I wish Betty
could see you now."
Her hand was upon the wall and he gave it a quick, pleased pressure.
"I wish to heaven she could," he echoed heartily.
"But I shall tell her everything when I write--everything. I shall tell her
that you are taller and stronger and that you have been in all the fights
and haven't a scar to show. Betty loves scars, you see, and she doesn't
mind even wounds--real wounds. She wanted to go into the hospitals, but I
came away and mamma wouldn't let her."
"For God's sake, don't let her," said Dan, with a shudder, his Southern
instincts recoiling from the thought of service for the woman he loved.
"There are a plenty of them in the hospitals and it's no place for Betty,
anyway."
"I'll tell her you think so," returned Virginia, gayly. "I'll tell her
that--and what else?"
He met her eyes smiling.
"Tell her I wait my time," he answered, and began to talk lightly of other
things. Virginia followed his lead with her old shy merriment.
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