_live_!... The sun
will rise--the days will be long and pleasant--you can work--_do_
something. You can fish the streams in summer and climb the hills in
autumn. You can enjoy. Bah! don't tell me one shallow girl means the
world. If Margie hasn't courage enough to run off and marry you--_let
her go!_ But you can never tell. Maybe Margie will stick to you. I'll
help you. Margie and I have always been friends and I'll try to
influence her. Then think of your mother and sister. Work for _them_.
Forget yourself--your little, miserable, selfish desires.... My God,
boy, but it's a strange life the war's left us to face. I _hate_ it.
So do you hate it. Swann and Mackay giving nothing and getting all!...
So it looks.... But it's false--false. God did not intend men to live
solely for their bodies. A balance _must_ be struck. They have _got_
to pay. Their time will come.... As for you, the harder this job is
the fiercer you should be. I've got to die, Holt. But if I could live
I'd show these slackers, these fickle wild girls, what they're
doing.... You can do it, Holt. It's the greatest part any man could be
called upon to play. It will prove the difference between you and
them...."

Holt Dalrymple crushed Lane's hand in both his own. On his face was a
glow--his dark eyes flashed: "Lane--that'll be about all," he burst
out with a kind of breathlessness. Then his head high, he stalked out.

The next day was bad. Lane suffered from both over-exertion and
intensity of emotion. He remained at home all day, in bed most of the
time. At supper time he went downstairs to find Lorna pirouetting in a
new dress, more abbreviated at top and bottom than any costume he had
seen her wear. The effect struck him at an inopportune time. He told
her flatly that she looked like a French grisette of the music halls,
and ought to be ashamed to be seen in such attire.

"Daren, I don't think you're a good judge of clothes these days," she
observed, complacently. "The boys will say I look spiffy in this."

So many times Lorna's trenchant remarks silenced Lane. She hit the
nail on the head. Practical, logical, inevitable were some of her
speeches. She knew what men wanted. That was the pith of her meaning.
What else mattered?

"But Lorna, suppose you don't look nice?" he questioned.

"I _do_ look nice," she retorted.

"You don't look anything of the kind."

"What's nice? It's only a word. It doesn't mean much in my young
life."

"Where are yo