she was thinking about. What in the world did she mean by saying
she'd like to be a deserter herself? One of her preposterous sayings--but
it was true that considerable truth had often lurked at the heart of
Katie's absurd way of talking.

Watching her, he was drawn to thought of her attractiveness and that made
him wonder whom Katie would marry. He had always been secretly proud of
his sister's popularity; it seemed she should make a brilliant marriage.
Live brilliantly. It was the thing to which she was adapted. Katie was
unique. Distinctive. Secretly, unadmittedly, he was very ambitious for
her. And with a little smile he considered that seemingly Katie was just
shrewd enough to be ambitious for herself. She had steered her little
bark safely past the place where she would be likely to marry a
lieutenant. Was she heading for a general?

So he reflected with humor and affection, watching Katie beat the tattoo
on the window.

Thought of what some one had said of her as the army girl suggested
something that changed his mood, bringing him suddenly to his feet.
"Katie," he demanded, "how much did you ever talk to this fellow? You
don't think, do you, that he was trying to get you for his 'army
girl'--or some such rot? If I thought that--You don't think, do you,
Katie, that that was what he was trying to work you for?"

Katie suddenly raised her hands and pushed back her hair, for the minute
covering her eyes. "No, Wayne," she said, "I don't think that was what he
was trying to 'work me' for."

And unable to bear more, she told him that she was very tired and asked
him to go.

CHAPTER XL

Katie Jones was very gay that winter. She made her home at her uncle's,
near Washington, though most of the time she was in Washington itself,
with various cousins and friends; there were always people wanting Katie,
especially that winter, when she had such unfailing zest for gayety.

They wondered that she should not be more broken up at her brother's
absurd move in quitting the army--just at the time the army offered him
so much. She seemed to take it very easily; though Katie was not one to
take things hard, too light of spirit for that. And they wondered about
his marriage to a girl whom nobody but Katie knew anything about. Katie
seemed devoted to her and happy in the marriage.

"Why, naturally I am pleased," she said to a group of army people who
were inquiring about Wayne's bride. "She is my best friend. The gi