At that moment he heard a tap at the door, and opening it, Lawrence was standing on the threshold.
He entered, taking off his cap and loosening his heavy uniform greatcoat.

Once he had been a handsome fellow, but he had danced too long to the devil's fiddling, and that always spoils a man's looks.
For the first time, Lawrence seemed to forget the distance between the private soldier and the officer.

He sat down heavily, without waiting for an invitation, and turned a haggard face on Broussard.
"So you are going," said Lawrence.
"Yes," replied Broussard.
Broussard saw that Lawrence was oppressed at the thought, there would be no more Broussard to help him pay the post trader's bills and to give him a good word when he got into trouble with the non-coms.
Broussard handed him a box of cigars and Lawrence absently took one.
It was a very expensive cigar, as Broussard's things were all expensive.

Lawrence, after rolling it in his fingers for a moment, laid it down.
"It's a shame not to be able to smoke such a brand as that," he said, "but the truth is, I can't stand tobacco to-night.

It makes me nervous instead of soothing me." Broussard, lighting a cigar for himself, looked closely at Lawrence, whose face was pallid and his eye sombre and uneasy.
"What's the trouble?
More bills at the post trader's ?" asked Broussard.
"Worse," replied Lawrence, becoming more agitated as he spoke.