"Peter," he said, "you're a weird blighter, but there's something damned gritty in you.

You take life too strenuously.

Why can't you saunter through it like I do ?" Peter reached for this cap.

"Come on," he said again, "and don't talk rot." Out in the street, they strolled aimlessly on, more or less in silence.
The big book-shop at the corner detained them for a little, and they regarded its variegated contents through the glass.

It contained a few good prints, and many more poorly executed coloured pictures of ruined places in France and Belgium, of which a few, however, were not bad.
Cheek by jowl with some religious works, a statue of Notre Dame d'Albert, and some more of Jeanne d'Arc, were a line of pornographic novels and beyond packets of picture post-cards entitled _Theatreuses, Le Bain de la Parisienne, Les Seins des Marbre_, and so on.