She laughed and slipped away. “Oh, please don’t go,” cried Joan. “Mrs. Stopperton has just gone round to the doctor’s. She won’t be long. I’m a friend of hers.”!

Joan answered with a faint smile. “Oh, yes,” she said. “I didn’t forget that argument in case it hadn’t occurred to the Lord.” “You won’t be able to indulge in all your mad schemes,” he laughed, “but there’ll be enough to help on a few. And you will be among friends. Arthur told me he had explained it to you and that you had agreed.”

Joan thought his mistake lay in regarding man’s happiness as more important to him than his self-development. It was not what we got out of civilization but what we put into it that was our gain. Its luxuries and ostentations were, in themselves, perhaps bad for us. But the pursuit of them was good. It called forth thought and effort, sharpened our wits, strengthened our brains. Primitive man, content with his necessities, would never have produced genius. Art, literature, science would have been stillborn. He looked straight into her eyes. “You are,” he said. “I have been reading your articles. They are splendid. I’m going to help.” The wounded men had heard it also. Dubos had moved forward. Madame Lelanne had risen. It came again, the thin, faint shrill of a distant bugle. Footsteps were descending the stairs. French soldiers, laughing, shouting, were crowding round them.