"Isn't it queer the way death affects you under different
circumstances? I didn't see such an awful lot of action in France, but
once a raiding party of Heinies tumbled into our trench, and there was
a deuce of a ruction for a few minutes. Between bayonets and bombs we
cleaned the lot, a couple of dozen of them. After it was all over, we
stacked them up like cordwood--with about as much compunction. It
seemed perfectly natural. There was nothing but the excitement of
winning a scrap. The half-dozen of our own fellows that went west in
the show--they didn't matter either. It was part of the game. You
expected it. It didn't surprise you. It didn't shock you. Yet death is
death. Only, there, it seemed a natural consequence. And here
it--well, I don't know why, but it gives me a horror."
Lawanne sat down.
"It was so unnecessary; so useless," he went on in that lifeless tone.
"The damned, egotistic fool! Two lives sacrificed to a stupid man's
wounded vanity. That's all. She was a singularly attractive woman. She
would have been able to get a lot out of life.
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