He had the air of one who is insistent on the little honesties of life.
There was also a faintly spirituous atmosphere about him, and his eyes looked a little less sunken.
Then he handed over the cigarettes.
"Shouldn't mind one myself," he said genially.
Frank gave him one before lighting his own.
"You're a good sort," said the Major, "and I wish I could give you one of my old cigars I used to give my friends." "Ah! well, when your ship comes home," observed Frank, throwing away his match.
The Major nodded his head as with an air of fallen grandeur.
"Well," he said, "_vorwaerts_.

That means 'forward,' my dear," he explained to Gertie.
Gertie said nothing.

They took up their bundles and went on.
(V) It was not till a week later that Gertie did that which was to effect so much in Frank--she confided in him.
The week had consisted of the kind of thing that might be expected--small negligible adventures; work now and then--the Major and Frank working side by side--a digging job on one day, the carrying of rather dingy smoke-stained hay on another, the scraping of garden-paths that ran round the small pink house of a retired tradesman, who observed them magnificently though a plate-glass window all the while, with a cigar in his teeth, and ultimately gave them ninepence between them.
They slept here and there--once, on a rainy night, in real lodgings, once below a haystack.

Frank said hardly a word to Gertie, and did little more than listen to the Major, who was already beginning to repeat himself; but he was aware that the girl was watching him.
The crisis came about under circumstances that might be expected--on a rather sentimental kind of Sunday evening, in a village whose name I forget (perhaps it was Escrick) between Selby and York.

Frank had made a small excursion by himself in the morning and had managed to hear mass; they had dined well off cold bacon and beans, and had walked on in the afternoon some miles further; and they came to the village a little after six o'clock.