He did not look at me, but answered quietly and thoughtfully:

"At least a man ought to be his fellows' friend, seeing that to them he
is beholden for everything that he possesses and for everything that he
contains. I myself have lived--"

Here, with a contraction of his brows, he fell to gazing about him, as
though he were seeking the necessary word; until, seeming to fail to
find it, he continued gravely:

"Men need to be brought closer together, until life shall have become
better adjusted. Never forget those who are departed, for anything and
everything in the life of a 'servant of God' may prove instructive and
of profound significance."

On the white sides of the memorial-stones, the setting sun was casting
warm lurid reflections, until the stonework looked as though it had
been splashed with hot blood. Moreover, every thing around us seemed
curiously to have swelled and grown larger and softer and less cold of
outline; the whole scene, though as motionless as ever, appeared to
have taken on a sort of bright-red humidity, and deposited that
humidity in purple, scintillating, quivering dew on the turf's various
spikes and tufts. Gradually, also, the shadows were deepening and
lengthening, while on the further side of the cemetery wall a cow lowed
at intervals, in a gross and drunken fashion, and a party of fowls
cackled what seemed to be curses in response, and a saw grated and
screeched.

Suddenly the Lieutenant burst into a peal of subdued laughter, and
continued to do so until his shoulders shook. At length he said through
the paroxysms, as, giving me a push, he cocked his hat boyishly:

"I must confess that, that--that the view which I first took of you was
rather a tragic one. You see, when I saw a man lying prone on the grass
I said to myself: 'H'm! What is that?' Next I saw a young fellow
roaming about the cemetery with a frown settled on his face, and his
breeches bulging; and again I said to myself--"

"A book is lying in my breeches pocket," I interposed.

"Ah! Then I understand. Yes, I made a mistake, but a very, welcome one.
However, as I say, when I first saw you, I said to myself: 'There is a
man lying near that tomb. Perhaps he has a bullet, a wound, in his
temple?' And, as you know--"

He stopped to wink at me with another outburst of soft, good-humoured
laughter. Then he continued.

"Nevertheless, the scheme of which I have told you cannot really be
called a scheme, since it is merel