ism, slapped Barres on the
shoulder, lighted a pipe, and flung himself on the couch recently
vacated by Dulcie.

"This damned war," he said, "takes the native gaiety out of a
man--takes the laughter out of life. Over two years of it now, Garry;
and it's as though the sun is slowly growing dimmer every day."

"I know," nodded Barres.

"Sure you feel it. Everybody does. By God, I have periods of sickness
when the illustrated London periodicals arrive, and I see those dead
men pictured there--such fine, clean fellows--our own kind--half of
them just kids!--well, it hurts me to look at them, and, for the sheer
pain of it, I'm always inclined to shirk and turn that page quickly.
But I say to myself, 'Jim, they're dead fighting Christ's own battle,
and the least you can do is to read their names and ages, and look
upon their faces.'... And I do it."

"So do I," nodded Barres, sombrely gazing at the carpet.

After a silence, Westmore said:

"Well, the Boche has taken his medicine and canned Tirpitz--the wild
swine that he is. So I don't suppose we'll get mixed up in it."

"The Hun is a great liar," remarked Barres. "There's no telling."

"Are you going to Plattsburg again this year?" enquired Westmore.

"I don't know. Are you?"

"In the autumn, perhaps.... Garry, it's discouraging. Do you realise
what a gigantic task we have ahead of us if the Hun ever succeeds in
kicking us into this war? And what a gigantic mess we've made of two
years' inactivity?"

Barres, pondering, scowled at his own thoughts.

"And now," continued the other, "the Guard is off to the border, and
here we are, stripped clean, with the city lousy with Germans and
every species of Hun deviltry hatching out fires and explosions and
disloyal propaganda from the Atlantic to the Pacific, from the Lakes
to the Gulf!

"A fine mess!--no troops, nothing to arm them with, no modern
artillery, no preparations; the Boche growing more insolent, more
murderous, but slyer; a row on with Mexico, another brewing with
Japan, all Europe and Great Britain regarding us with contempt--I ask
you, can you beat it, Garry? Are there any lower depths for us?--any
sub-cellars of iniquity into which we can tumble, like the basket of
jelly-fish we seem to be!"

"It's a nightmare," said Barres. "Since Liege and the _Lusitania_,
it's been a bad dream getting worse. We'll have to wake, you know. If
we don't, we're of no more substance than the dream itself:--we _are_
the