y from the aeroplane accident, made him chief of
staff, and brought him victory, might well choose to ring down the
curtain of destiny for him in the charge that drove the last foot of the
invader off the soil of the Browns.... A voice was calling.... She heard
it hazily, with a sudden access of giddy fear, before it became a
cheerful, clarion cry that seemed to be repeating a message that had
already been spoken without her understanding it.

"He's safe, safe, safe, Miss Galland! He was not hit! He is on his way
back and ought to be here very soon!"

She heard herself saying "Thank you!" But that was not for some time.
The aide was already gone. He had had his thanks in the effect of the
news, which made him think that a chief of staff should not receive
congratulations for victory alone.

Lanny would return through the garden. She remained leaning against the
wagon body, still faint from happiness, waiting for him. She was drawing
deeper and longer breaths that were velvety with the glow of sunshine. A
flame, the flame that Lanny had desired, of many gentle yet passionate
tongues, leaping hither and thither in glad freedom, was in possession
of her being. When his figure appeared out of the darkness the flame
swept her to her feet and toward him. Though he might reject her he
should know that she loved him; this glad thing, after all the shame she
had endured, she could confess triumphantly.

But she stopped short under the whip of conscience. Where was her
courage? Where her sense of duty? What right had she, who had played
such a horrible part, to think of self? There were other sweethearts
with lovers alive who might be dead on the morrow if war continued. The
flame sank to a live coal in her secret heart. Another passion possessed
her as she seized Lanstron's hand in both her own.

"Lanny, listen! Not the sound of a shot--for the first time since the
war began! Oh, the blessed silence! It's peace, peace--isn't it to be
peace?" As they ascended the steps she was pouring out a flood of
broken, feverish sentences which permitted of no interruption. "You kept
on fighting to-day, but you won't to-morrow, will you? It isn't I who
plead--it's the women, more women than there are men in the army, who
want you to stop now! Can't you hear them? Can't you see them?"

In the fervor of appeal, before she realized his purpose, they were on
the veranda and at the door of the dining-room, where the Brown staff
was gathered