Poor Man's Rock by Bertrand W. Sinclair
page 53 of 320 (16%)
page 53 of 320 (16%)
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one has told you?"
He shook his head. "It is a fact," she declared. "The armistice was signed yesterday at eleven. Aren't you glad?" MacRae reflected a second. A week earlier he would have thrown up his cap and whooped. Now the tremendously important happening left him unmoved, unbelievably indifferent. He was not stirred at all by the fact of acknowledged victory, of cessation from killing. "I should be, I suppose," he muttered. "I know a lot of fellows will be--and their people. So far as I'm concerned--right now--" He made a quick gesture with his hands. He couldn't explain how he felt--that the war had suddenly and imperiously been relegated to the background for him. Temporarily or otherwise, as a spur to his emotions, the war had ceased to function. He didn't want to talk. He wanted to be let alone, to think. Yet he was conscious of a wish not to offend, to be courteous to this clear-eyed young woman who looked at him with frank interest. He wondered why he should be of any interest to her. MacRae had never been shy. Shyness is nearly always born of acute self-consciousness. Being free from that awkward inturning of the mind Jack MacRae was not thoroughly aware of himself as a likable figure in any girl's sight. Four years overseas had set a mark on many such as himself. A man cannot live through manifold chances of death, face great perils, do his work under desperate risks and survive, without some trace of his deeds being |
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