so clear as her lovely wiseness and fine perceptive entirety of sympathy
and poise.

"I never have to explain really," he said more than once. "You would
understand even if I were an idiot or a criminal. And you'd understand
if I were an archangel."

With a deep awareness she knew that, when she first realised that the
shadow was rising, it would be different. She would have to watch it
with an aloofness more delicate and yet more warmly sensitive than any
other. In the days when she first thought of him as like one who is
listening to a far-off sound, it seemed possible that in the clamour of
louder echoes this one might lose itself and at last die away even from
memory. It was youth's way to listen and youth's way to find it easy to
forget. He heard many reverberations in these days and had much reason
for thought and action. He thought a great deal, he worked
energetically, he came and went, he read and studied, he obeyed orders
and always stood ready for new ones. Her pride in his vigorous
initiative and practical determination was a glowing flame in her heart.
He meant to be no toy soldier.

As she became as practical a worker as he was, they did much together
and made plans without ceasing. When he was away she was always doing
things in which he was interested and when he returned he always brought
to her suggestions for new service or the development of the old. But as
the days passed and became weeks she knew that the far-off sound was
still being listened to. She could not have told how--but she knew. And
she saw the beloved dearness and beauty growing in him. He came into the
house each day in his khaki as if khaki were a shining thing. When he
laughed, or sat and smiled, or dreamed--forgetting she was there--her
very heart quaked with delight in him. Another woman than Robin counted
over his charms and made a tender list of them, wondering at each one.
As a young male pheasant in mating time dons finer gloss and brilliancy
of plumage, perhaps he too bloomed and all unconscious developed added
colour and inches and gallant swing of tread. As people turned half
astart to look at Robin bending over her desk or walking about among
them in her modest dress, so also did they turn to look after him as he
went in springing march along the streets.

"Some day he will begin to tell me," Helen used to say to herself at
night. "He may only _begin_--but perhaps it will be to-morrow."

It was not, however, to-morro