held
her hands in his. "We have both a great deal to do while the War lasts.
Will you follow me, and let us work together?" In the moment of parting,
it was not possible to keep out of his eyes all his lips could not say,
and Honor promised.

EPILOGUE

ALL'S WELL

It was something more than four years later, when the Armistice was
signed amid world-wide rejoicings of the Allied Nations, that a young
soldier, bronzed and upright, rang the bell of a beautiful flat in
Brighton, over-looking the sea. Above his breast pocket, on the left,
were two ribbons, the D.S.O. and the M.C., the sight of which had won
him glances of approval and soft looks of admiration, all the way along.
Those bits of ribbon told wordlessly of self-sacrifice and devotion to
duty; valour and endurance;--they suggested to the subconscious mind,
danger, bodily discomfort, and endurance to the limit of human
suffering, so that this brisk little freckled officer of very ordinary
looks, was marked for all time, by those who knew, as one of the many
special heroes of the most terrible war the world has ever known.

He was shown into the drawing-room, and, in a moment, a gracious lady
swept in with welcome in her eyes and both hands extended.

"Oh, Tommy!--how good it is to see you safe!"

"And to see you looking so fit, Honey--dear old girl!"

"I was beginning to feel quite anxious, as you had not written for a
month!"

"There was so much doing. Besides, I was reserving it all for our
meeting."

They had much to talk about; he, of his vicissitudes in Mesopotamia, and
she, of her husband and his work in the war-hospital in Brighton to
which he was attached. Last of all, Tommy asked to see his god-son to
whom he had yet to be introduced.

"He is such a perfect darling!" said Honor beaming upon her visitor
happily; "the very image of Brian." Pressing a bell, she gave her orders
which were promptly obeyed by a nurse who entered with the baby, a lusty
boy with grey-green eyes, and lips firmly locked in a cupid's bow.

"Hullo!" said Tommy, "shake hands with 'Uncle'!"

"Say, 'How do'?" said Honor, kissing the velvet cheek.

"'Ow do!" said Baby staring at the pretty coloured ribbons on the khaki
tunic.

"This is the age at which I like them best," said Tommy admiringly.
"He's 'some' kid! Do you remember trying to interest me in the Meredith
infant when it was a glorified dummy in long clothes?"

"Yes, and you wasted your energies trying