n whose cropped dark hair has felt
like velvet beneath a woman's lips? The only man whose laugh has pierced
a woman's heart "straight as a pebble drops into a pool"?

The woman knows better. I know some one who----

* * * * *

Suddenly I saw his dark head, his laughing face in the mirror before me.

Jim!

I thought I must be dreaming.

I turned; I met his black-lashed blue gaze.

His broad-shouldered, khaki-clad form filled up the narrow doorway of Vi
Vassity's dressing-room.

"Child," he called in the inexpressibly soft Irish voice.

He held out his arms.

It was he--my husband.

I ran to him....

"Gently," he said, wincing ever so little. "Mind my shoulder, now. It's
smashed--more or less completely."

I cried out, seeing now that the jacket hung like a dolman upon his
shoulder. I faltered the thought that would come to any woman. Yes!
However brave she was, however glad to let her man go out to do "his
bit," there is a limit to what she is willing to lose ... and there are
still young and strong and able-bodied civilians in England, untouched
even by a Zeppelin bomb!

I said: "You can't--you can't be sent out again?"

"Bad cess to it, no," frowned my husband. "Don't look so relieved now,
or I'll have to feel ashamed of you, Lady Ballyneck----"

"What d'you call me?" I asked, not comprehending. It was some minutes
before I did understand what he said about his dad and his brother
Terence, both "outed" the same day at Neuve Chapelle.

"And ourselves saddled with the God-forsaken castle and the estate, save
the mark," said my husband, Lord Ballyneck, ruefully. "What we'll do
with it until we let it to Miss Million at a princely rental (as I mean
to) the dear only knows! It's a fine match you've made for yourself,
child, though, when all's said. A title, at all events. Sure I might
have done better for myself," he concluded, with his blue eyes, alive
with mirth and tenderness, feasting on my face. "I might have done
better for myself than Miss Million's maid!"

THE END

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