Joan sighed. It looked as if the word had been passed round to treat the whole thing as a joke. Mrs. Denton took a different view. “Are you, too, a Christian?” he asked of Joan.!

“Oh,” said Miss Tolley. “And were there any children?” “I’ll be lonely and anxious till you come back,” he said. “But that will have to be my part of the fight.”

“It’s a noble ideal,” he said. “La Patrie! The great Mother. Right or wrong, who shall dare to harm her? Yes, if it was she who rose up in her majesty and called to us.” He laughed. “What does it mean in reality: Germania, Italia, La France, Britannia? Half a score of pompous old muddlers with their fat wives egging them on: sons of the fools before them; talkers who have wormed themselves into power by making frothy speeches and fine promises. My Country!” he laughed again. “Look at them. Can’t you see their swelling paunches and their flabby faces? Half a score of ambitious politicians, gouty old financiers, bald-headed old toffs, with their waxed moustaches and false teeth. That’s what we mean when we talk about ‘My Country’: a pack of selfish, soulless, muddle-headed old men. And whether they’re right or whether they’re wrong, our duty is to fight at their bidding—to bleed for them, to die for them, that they may grow more sleek and prosperous.” He sank back on his pillow with another laugh. A robin broke into a song of triumph. He had seen the sad-faced ghosts steal silently away. “Are you, too, a Christian?” he asked of Joan.