"No."

"Why not?"

"My dear sister, that's hard to say. Because I didn't deserve it, most
likely."

She leaned back to gaze more thoughtfully at him.

"What did you get this for?"

"It's a long story. Some day I'll tell you."

"Are you proud of it?"

For answer he only smiled at her.

"It's so long since the war I've forgotten so many things," she said,
wonderingly. Then she smiled sweetly. "Dare, I'm proud of you."

That was a moment in which his former emotion seemed to stir for her.
Evidently she had lost track of something once memorable. She was
groping back for childish impressions. It was the only indication of
softness he had felt in her. How impossible to believe Lorna was only
fifteen! He could form no permanent conception of her. But in that
moment he sensed something akin to a sister's sympathy, some vague and
indefinable thought in her, too big for her to grasp. He never felt it
again. The serious sweet mood vanished.

"Hot dog! I've a brother with the _Croix de Guerre_. I'll swell up