to
think about it, but when I did--"

"You'd think 'She might have spared me _that_.'"

"Yes. And you might think of your people. It's bad enough for them,
Nicky going."

"It isn't only that I'd have liked to be where you'll be, and where
he'll be. That was natural."

"It's also natural that we should like to find you here when we come
back."

"I was thinking of those Belgian women, and the babies--and England; so
safe, Frank; so disgustingly safe."

"I know. Leaving the children in the burning house?"

(She had said that once and he had remembered.)

"You can do more for them by staying in England--I'm asking you to take
the hardest job, really."

"It isn't; if it's what you want most."

He had risen. He was going. His hands were on her shoulders, and they
were still discussing it as if it were the most momentous thing.

"Of course," she said, "I won't go if you feel like that about it. I
want you to fight comfy. You mustn't worry about me."

"Nor you about me. I shall be all right. Remember--it's _your_ War,
too--it's the biggest fight for freedom--"

"I know," she said.

And then: "Have you got all your things?"

"Somebody's got 'em."

"I haven't given you anything. You must have my wrist-watch."

She unstrapped the leather band and put it on him.

"My wrist's a whopper."

"So's mine. It'll just meet--at the last hole. It's phosphorous," she
said. "You can see the time by it in the dark."

"I've nothing for _you_. Except--" he fumbled in his pockets--"I
say--here's the wedding-ring."

They laughed.

"What more could you want?" she said.

He put it on her finger; she raised her face to him and he stooped and
kissed her. He held her for a minute in his arms. But it was not like
yesterday.

Suddenly his face stiffened. "Tell them," he said, "that I'm going."

The British were retreating from Mons.

The German attack was not like the advance of an Army but like the
travelling of an earthquake, the bursting of a sea-wall. There was no
end to the grey battalions, no end to the German Army, no end to the
German people. And there was no news of British reinforcements, or
rumour of reinforcements.

"They come on like waves. Like waves," said Dorothea, reading from the
papers.

"I wouldn't read about it if I were you, darling," said Frances.

"Why not? It isn't going to last long. We'll rally. See if we don't."

Dorothea's clear, hard mind had gone under for the time, given way
before