n premises, his brother's, his father's if it
would help. Well, then he took a pen and filled in the blank space with
the detail which is to make your house and garden the centre of an
inferno."

"How Christian!" breathed Marta. "I suppose he loves his grandchildren
and that they are taught the Lord's prayer!"

"I believe his only pastime is playing with them," admitted Lanstron,
stumbling on, trying to be loyal to Partow, to duty, to country, no
longer calm or dispassionate, but demoralized under the lash. "He tells
them that when they are grown he hopes there will be an end of war."

"Worse yet--a hypocrite!"

"But, Marta, I never knew a man more sincere. He is working to the same
end as you--peace. If the Grays would play with fire he would give them
such a burning that they will never try again. He would make war too
horrible for practice; fix the frontier forever where by, right it
belongs; make conquest by one civilized nation of another impossible
hereafter. Yes, when it is stalemate, when it is proved that the science
of modern defence has made the weak so strong that superior numbers
cannot play the bully, then shall we have peace in practice!"

"My children's prayer and Partow in the same gallery!" she laughed
stonily. "The peace of armament, not of man's superiority to the tiger
and the tarantula! And you say it all so calmly. You picture the hell of
your manufacture as coolly as if it were some fairies' dance!"

"Should I be enthusiastic? Should I view the prospect with an
old-fashioned Hussar's hurrah?" he asked. "The right way is without
illusions. Let us lose our heads, cry out for glory--and then chaos!"

"The heedless barbarism of ignorance intoxicated with primitive passion
versus calculating, refined, intellectual, comprehending barbarism! I
see no choice," she concluded, rising slowly in the utter weariness of
spirit that calls for the end of an interview.

"Marta, you will promise not to remain at the house?" he urged.

"Isn't that my affair?" she asked. "Aren't you willing to leave even
that to me after all you have been telling how you are to make a redoubt
of our lawn, inviting the shells of the enemy into our drawing-room?"

What could he say in face of a hostility so resolute and armed with the
conviction of its logic? Only call up from the depths the two passions
of his life in an outburst, with all the force of his nature in play.

"I love this soil, my country's soil, ours by righ