“Well!  There it is!  We must all die sooner or later.  It’s a wonder I ain’t dead already.  I’ve bin in some tight places since I come out for the Y.M.C.A....

“And talkin’ about the Y.M.C.A., miss, I do beg of you, if you get out of this—­an’ I’m sure you will—­they’ll never kill you,” said Bertie adoringly, looking up at the grave, beautiful face that bent over him—­“I do beg of you to make matters right with the Y.M.C.A.  I ain’t taken away one penny of their money—­I served ’em faithfully up to the last day before I saw my chance of hooking it across the lines—­They must think me dead—­and so must poor Nance, my wife.  For I haven’t dared to write to any one since I’ve bin in Belgium.  But I did send her a line ‘fore I started, sayin’, ’Don’t be surprised if you get no letter from me for some time.  I’ll turn up all right, you bet your boots—­’

“That may ’ave kept ’er ‘opin’.  An’ soon you’ll be able to let ’er know.  Who can say? I dunno!  But Peace, you’d think, must come soon—­Seems like our poor old world is comin’ to an end, don’t it? What times we’ve ‘ad—­if you don’t mind me puttin’ it like that!  I remember when I had to be awful careful always to say ‘Sir’ to you, and ‘Mr. David’ or ‘Mr. Williams’”—­and a roguish look, a gleam of merriment came into Bertie’s eyes, and he laughed a laugh that was half sob.  “If you was to write your life, no one ’ud believe it, miss.  It licks any novel I ever read—­and I’ve read a tidy few, looking after the Y.M.C.A. libraries....

“My!  But you was wonderful as a pleader in the courts!  I used sometimes to reg’lar cry when I heard you takin’ up the case of some poor girl as ’ad bin deserted by ’er feller, and killed ’er baby.  ‘Tricks of the trade,’ says some other barrister’s clerk, sneerin’ because you wasn’t ‘is boss.  An’ then I’d punch ’is ‘ead....  An’ I don’t reckon myself a soft-’earted feller as a rule....  Reklect that Shillito Case—?”

“Don’t, Bertie! Don’t say such things in praise of me.  I’m not worth such love.  I’m just an arrogant, vain, quarrelsome woman....  Look how many people I’ve deceived, what little good I’ve really done in the world—­”

“Rub—­bish!  You done good wherever you went ... to my pore mother—­wonder, by the bye, what she thinks and ’ow she’s gettin’ on?  Sons are awful ungrateful and forgettin’.  What with you—­and Nance—­and the little ’uns, I ain’t scarcely give a thought to poor mother.  But you’ll let her know, won’t you, miss?...

“Think ’ow good you was to your old father down in Wales, ’im as you called your father—­an’ ’oo’s to say ’e wasn’t?  You never know....  Miss Warren! what a pity it is you never married.  There’s lots was sweet on you, I’ll bet.  Yet I remember I used to ’ate the idea of your doin’ so, and was glad you dressed up as a man, an’ took ’em all in....  I may tell you all, miss, now I’m goin’ to die, day after to-morrow.  My poor Nance!  She see there was some one that always occupied my mind, and she used to get jealous-like, at times.  But never did I let on it was you.  Why I wouldn’t even ’av said it to myself—­I respected you more than—­than—­”