“He wasn’t with you last night.” “How do you know about last night?” “I heard you coughing and--and----” “Crying! I could not help it. I was very tired, and the pain wouldn’t let me go to sleep whichever way I turned.” “Have you often bad nights like that?” “No, I haven’t had. But mother says father got pretty bad before the end. He was like me, you know. I’ll eat the plum-cake now, if you don’t mind.” “What are you fondest of? Do you like reading?” “My eyes get tired soon. I like thinking best.” “What about?” “Kings and queens and big soldiers. If I had lived I should have been a big soldier. When the soldiers went to the war, and the bugles sounded, I limped after them and got lost. It was very cold and snowy, and I was out all night till a policeman found me. That is how I began to be ill. And Dr Quack, when I told him, said it shows I was born to be a soldier. He says it’s the next best thing to being killed in the war--because I’m going to die, you know, through following the soldiers. It’s over two years since that they went away. Dr Quack says they’ll be coming back now soon.” “His real name isn’t Dr Quack, is it?” The boy nodded seriously. “He said it was himself. He told my mother--and he never smiled once, so I know he spoke the truth. Mother doesn’t like him half so much as I do, because he likes the windows open and she doesn’t. And mother says he isn’t easy to talk to. But I think he is. She says father was a very comfortable man, and had some consideration for her feelings--about the draughts, you know.” “I don’t think draughts are pleasant things myself,” said Marigold. “You don’t want draughts, you want fresh air.” “Yes,” said the boy, looking up at her eagerly and feverishly, “I know. And he says that soon he is coming to take me away to a place where the air is beautiful and all the houses big and fine. And I shall have a sword and learn the proper way of fighting like a man. But if he isn’t quick I’m afraid it’ll be too late. It was Monday morning he told me of it all, and I felt that I was getting better. And then last night I was all alone in the dark and nothing seemed true, and I kept calling out for him to come--‘Dr Quack!’ because he had said he would come when the night was darkest. And it was very, very dark, and yet he never came at all.” “Perhaps he didn’t know you were so bad. You’ll have to tell him when he comes again.” “Yes. Do you live next door?” “Yes, we have a little cottage just like yours.” “Who else lives there?” “My--my aunt.” “Is she good to you?” “Very.” “Who is it that sings, and laughs, and makes all the noise--thumps up the stairs, I mean, and thumps down them?” “Well, I expect that’s a mixture. Part me and part my--my aunt.” “You do the singing and laughing, don’t you?” “Yes.”