But he didn't go down immediately to the water.

He sat there and nursed his knees and began to think.

Whether it was Howard's unexpected talk of Plattsburg and of being made something of or not he didn't know.

What he did know was that he was suddenly filled with a sort of fright....
"Good God," he said to himself, "time's rushing away, and I'm nearly twenty-six.

I'm as old as some men who have done things and made things and are planted on their feet.