Cards undoubtedly admired
his stocky, determined strength, his grey eyes, his brusque speech, his
ability at games. He did not pretend also that he was not flattered by
Peter's attentions. Curiously, for so young a boy, he had a satirical
irony that showed him the world very much in the light that he was always
afterwards to see it. To Cards the world was a show, a Vanity Fair--a place
where manner, _savoir-faire_, dignity, humour and ease, mattered
everything; he saw also that there was nothing by which people are so
easily deceived.
Peter had none of these things; he would always be rough, he would never be
elegant, and afterwards, in life, Cards did not suppose that he would see
very much of Peter, their lives would be along different paths; but now,
more genuinely perhaps than ever again, Cards was to admire that honest
bedrock of feeling, of sentiment, of criticism, of love and anger, that
gave Peter his immense value.
"There is a fellow here," wrote Cards to his mother, "whom I like very
much. He's got a most awful lot of stuff in him although he doesn't say
much and he looks like nothing on earth sometimes. He's very good at
football, although he's only been here a year. His name is Westcott--Peter
Westcott. I expect I'll bring him back one holiday."
But, of course, he never did. Peter, when it came to actuality, wouldn't
look right at home.
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