ry one, civilians as well as fighting-men. The
blackness of insecurity----! We're all convalescing." She halted
abruptly, biting her lip and peering at him, suddenly aware that she had
been confessing herself. When he only looked puzzled, she finished
lightly, "So, you see, Tabs, though you'll think me terribly immoral, I
keep a soft place in my heart for our skeleton."

"But you don't tell me anything positive," he complained. "What has
Adair done?"

"Done!" She stared at him. "That's what I have been telling you. He's
fallen in love with some one else."

He was unwilling to believe what he had heard.

"Some one else! Impossible!---- I'm sorry, Terry; I didn't mean that I
doubted your word. You mustn't be offended, but---- I'm picturing
Phyllis. At her best she was good and sweet and pretty enough to hold
any man. She was such a loyal little pal--only second best to you,
Terry. And Adair--he was such a white man, so patient with her and so
devoted to the kiddies. I can't see him in the role of a runaway. And
what on earth would he gain by it that he hasn't got already? I don't
want to think that what you've told me---- It makes all fidelity seem so
contemptibly temporary."

Terry spoke gently. "Not that. It's infidelity that is temporary. A lot
of us are unfaithful for the moment--it's a symptom of our illness. You
said something a little while ago about trying to regain one's lost
years by violence--that's what he's doing. He's mislaid the knack of
happiness with Phyllis; he's trying to recover it with some one else."

Tabs was still rebelling against the facts. "But he was such a staid old
fellow."

Terry ignored his discursiveness. "I don't think I've done wrong in
letting you into our family secrets. You'll be made a part of them as
soon as you meet Daddy. When he heard that you were coming to town and
that I was going to see you, he said, 'Thank God for that. Taborley will
be able to do something.' He has a pathetic belief in you, Tabs. One of
the reasons why I was at the station this morning was that I might have
the chance to tell you first, before any one else had prejudiced you
with bitterness. Daddy wants you to dine with him to-night. He expects
you to be the kind of moral policeman who makes the arrest. But it can't
be done with morality. I don't think even you could manage to persuade
Adair at the present--not with moral arguments, anyhow."

"Why not?"

"Because I've seen _her_."

VI

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