They were stories of death, of hazardous exploits, of the pinch of famine, and the chill of snow.

But they were told in clipped words and with a matter-of-fact tone, as though the men who related them were only conscious of them as far-off things; and there was seldom a comment more pronounced than a mere "That's curious," or an exclamation more significant than a laugh.
But Harry Feversham sat listening as though the incidents thus carelessly narrated were happening actually at that moment and within the walls of that room.

His dark eyes--the eyes of his mother--turned with each story from speaker to speaker, and waited, wide open and fixed, until the last word was spoken.

He listened fascinated and enthralled.

And so vividly did the changes of expression shoot and quiver across his face, that it seemed to Sutch the lad must actually hear the drone of bullets in the air, actually resist the stunning shock of a charge, actually ride down in the thick of a squadron to where guns screeched out a tongue of flame from a fog.