The door opened swiftly and Jack, very stern-faced, entered. He looked at Somers in anger and contempt, then went to the bedside. The nurse hovered in the doorway with an anxious face. “What is it, ’Roo?” said Jack, in a voice of infinite tenderness, that made Somers shiver inside his skin. “What’s wrong, Chief, what’s wrong, dear old man?” Kangaroo turned his face and looked at Somers vindictively. “That man’s killed me,” he said in a distinct voice. “No, I think you’re wrong there, old man,” said Jack. “Mr Somers has never done anything like that. Let me give you a morphia injection, to ease you, won’t you?” “Leave me alone.” Then, in a fretful, vague voice: “I wanted him to love me.” “I’m sure he loves you, ’Roo--sure he does.” “Ask him.” Jack looked at Richard and made him a sharp, angry sign with his brows, as if bidding him comply. “You love our one-and-only Kangaroo all right, don’t you, Mr Somers?” he said in a manly, take-it-for-granted voice. “I have an immense regard for him,” muttered Richard. “Regard! I should think so. We’ve got more than regard. I love the man--love him--love him I do. Don’t I, ’Roo?” But Kangaroo had sunk down, and his face had gone small, he was oblivious again. “I want nurse,” he whispered. “Yes, all right,” said Jack, rising from bending over the sick man. Somers had already gone to the door. The nurse entered, and the two men found themselves in the dark passage. “I shall have to be coming along, Mr Somers, if you’ll wait a minute,” said Jack. “I’ll wait outside,” said Somers. And he went out and down to the street, into the sun, where people were moving about. They were like pasteboard figures shifting on a flat light. After a few minutes Jack joined him. “Poor ’Roo, it’s a question of days now,” said Jack. “Yes.” “Hard lines, you know, when a man’s in his prime and just ready to enter into his own. Bitter hard lines.” “Yes.” “That’s why I think you were a bit hard on him. I _do_ love him myself, so I can say so without exaggerating the fact. But if I hated the poor man like hell, and saw him lying there in that state--why, I’d swear on red-hot iron I loved him, I would. A man like that--a big, grand man, as great a hero as ever lived. If a man can’t speak two words out of pity for a man in his state, why, I think there’s something wrong with that man. Sorry to have say it. But if Old Harry himself had lain there like that and asked me to say I loved him I’d have done it. Heart-breaking, it was. But I suppose some folks is stingy about sixpence, and others is stingy about saying two words that would give another poor devil his peace of mind.” Richard walked on in angry silence. He hated being condemned in this free-and-easy, rough-and-ready fashion.