he spirit of holding back, of
cheating their government. That's what war can do for your men. Make of
them the kind of men who some day can face their children without
having to hang their heads. Men who can answer for their part in making
the world a safe place for democracy."

An hour they stood there, the air quieting but chilling, and lavishly
sown stars cropping out. Street lights had come out, too, throwing up in
ever darker relief the figure above the heads of the crowd. His voice
had coarsened and taken on a raw edge, but every gesture was flung from
the socket, and from where they had forced themselves into the tight
circle Gertie Slayback, her mouth fallen open and her head still back,
could see the sinews of him ripple under khaki and the diaphragm lift
for voice.

There was a shift of speakers then, this time a private, still too
rangy, but his looseness of frame seeming already to conform to the
exigency of uniform.

"Come on, Jimmie. I--I'm cold."

They worked out into the freedom of the sidewalk, and for ten minutes,
down blocks of petty shops already lighted, walked in a silence that
grew apace.

He was suddenly conscious that she was crying, quietly, her handkerchief
wadded against her mouth. He strode on with a scowl and his head bent.

"Let's sit down in this little park, Jimmie. I'm tired."

They rested on a bench on one of those small triangles of
breathing-space which the city ekes out now and then; mill ends of land
parcels.

He took immediately to roving the toe of his shoe in and out among the
gravel. She stole out her hand to his arm.

"Well, Jimmie?" Her voice was in the gauze of a whisper that hardly left
her throat.

"Well, what?" he said, still toeing.

"There--there's a lot of things we never thought about, Jimmie."

"Aw!"

"Eh, Jimmie?"

"You mean _you_ never thought about."

"What do you mean?"

"I know what I mean alrighty."

"I--I was the one that suggested it, Jimmie, but--but you fell in. I--I
just couldn't bear to think of it, Jimmie--your going and all. I
suggested it, but--you fell in."

"Say, when a fellow's shoved he falls. I never gave a thought to
sneaking an exemption until it was put in my head. I'd smash the fellow
in the face that calls me coward, I will."

"You could have knocked me down with a feather, Jimmie, looking at it
his way, all of a sudden."

"You couldn't me. Don't think I was ever strong for the whole business.
I mean the exemption