I used to imagine then it was not the unlicked cubs under the distant
tents I was protecting, but that I was awake to watch over and guard
Beatrice, or that I was a knight, standing his vigil so that he might
be worthy to wear the Red Cross and enter her service. In those lonely
watches I saw littlenesses and meannesses in myself, which I could not
see in the brisk light of day, and my self-confidence slipped from me
and left me naked and abashed. I saw myself as a vain, swaggering boy,
who, if he ever hoped to be a man among men, such as Beatrice was a
woman above all other women, must change his nature at once and
forever.

I was glad that I owed these good resolutions to her. I was glad that
it was she who inspired them. Those nights, as I leaned on my gun, I
dreamed even that it might end happily and beautifully in our
marriage. I wondered if I could make her care, if I could ever be
worthy of her, and I vowed hotly that I would love her as no other
woman was ever loved.

And then I would feel the cold barrel of my musket pressing against
the palm of my hand, or the bayonet would touch my cheek, and at the
touch something would tighten in my throat, and I would shake the
thoughts from me and remember that I was sworn to love only my country
and my country's flag.

In my third year here my grandfather died. As the winter closed in he
had daily grown more feeble, and sat hour after hour in his great
armchair, dozing and dreaming, before the open fire. And one morning
when he was alone in the room, Death, which had so often taken the man
at his side, and stood at salute to let him live until his work was
done, came to him and touched him gently. A few days later when his