At all events, it was habitual with this well-fed philosopher.
"We were forgetting Waterloo," I answered.
At that moment a merry laugh behind us made me turn.

It was not directed towards myself, and was doubtless raised by some incident which had escaped our notice.

The mere fact that this voice was raised in merriment did not make me wheel round on my heel as if I had been shot.

It was the voice itself--some note of sympathy which I seemed to have always known and yet never to have heard until this moment.

A strange thing--the reader will think--to happen to a man in his thirties, who had knocked about the world, doing but little good therein, as some are ready and even anxious to relate.
Strange it may be, but it was true.