come to succor that their task was made
easier and their burden at least bearable.

There was no shelter for any of them that night. They worked in the open,
and volunteers came from the ranks to do what they could. The surgeons
would have scorned them, but the nurse mustered in a score or more to keep
the fires under the kettles burning, to hold supplies and lanterns, to
make coffee when the sterilizing basins could be surrendered for the
purpose; and she showed those with pocket-knives how to cut away the
blood-soaked clothing. Caked with mud herself and desperately hungry, she
dressed and comforted as she went. The scene was ghastly--Verestchagin
might have painted it--but Sheila saw none of it. It was for her a time
exalted, even for those she helped to die. There was no sting in this
death. As she passed on and on in the darkness the space about her seemed
filled with the shadowy forms of those whom God was mustering out,
peacefully, gloriously waiting His command to march into a land of full
promise. So acutely did she feel this that a prayer rose to her lips and
stayed there, mute, half through the night, that some time she might be
given the chance to make this clear for those who mourned at home, to make
them feel that death, here, held no sting.

In the midst of it Sheila felt a heavy hand laid on her arm, and turned to
look into the face of the commander.

"Are you the nurse I ordered back two days ago?"

"I believe so."

"Who ordered you back again?"

"No one."

"How did you come?"

The girl laughed softly. She could not resist the memory of that flight.
"Engine went wrong and I--beat it. Don't blame the driver; he did his best
to obey orders. I joined the division last night and came on with my
chief."

"So there's no use in ordering you back?"

"None in the least--that is, not so long as the boys are coming in like
this."

"How long can you stand it?"

"As long as they can, sir." And then without rhyme or reason tears sprang
into the nurse's eyes, to her great mortification and terror. That would
probably finish her; a woman who cried had no place at the front, and the
general would dismiss her promptly and with scorn.

But he did not. The hand that had touched her arm reached out and gripped
her hand. She caught a whimsical smile brushing his lips in the dark.

"Good night. When you want your discharge, I'll sign it."

He went as swiftly and silently as he had come. The nurse turned bac