Joan laughed. “Difficult to get anything else, just at present,” she said. “It’s the soldiers I’m looking to for help. I don’t think the men who have been there will want their sons to go. It’s the women I’m afraid of.” It was half-past five when she sat down with her tea in front of her. It was only ten minutes’ walk to Charing Cross—say a quarter of an hour. She might pick up a cab. She grew calmer as she ate and drank. Her reason seemed to be returning to her. There was no such violent hurry. Hadn’t she better think things over, in the clear daylight? The woman had been ill now for nearly six weeks: a few hours—a day or two—could make no difference. It might alarm the poor creature, her unexpected appearance at such an unusual hour—cause a relapse. Suppose she had been mistaken? Hadn’t she better make a few inquiries first—feel her way? One did harm more often than good, acting on impulse. After all, had she the right to interfere? Oughtn’t the thing to be thought over as a whole? Mightn’t there be arguments, worth considering, against her interference? Her brain was too much in a whirl. Hadn’t she better wait till she could collect and arrange her thoughts?!

It was Carleton of the Daily Dispatch group who had first divined her possibilities. With a swift glance on his way through, he had picked her out from a line of depressed-looking men and women ranged against the wall of the dark entrance passage; and with a snap of his fingers had beckoned to her to follow him. Striding in front of her up to his room, he had pointed to a chair and had left her sitting there for three-quarters of an hour, while he held discussion with a stream of subordinates, managers and editors of departments, who entered and departed one after another, evidently in pre-arranged order. All of them spoke rapidly, without ever digressing by a single word from the point, giving her the impression of their speeches having been rehearsed beforehand. “Oh, he’s quite a nice lad,” she answered.

“Yes,” he said, “I love the sea. It’s clean and strong.” Again the question troubled her. She had not seen her father since that week-end, nearly six months ago, when she had ran down to see him because she wanted something from him. “He felt my mother’s death very deeply,” she answered. “But he’s well enough in health.” “Very beautiful,” he answered, “in the beginning.”