“Do you really think she’ll get over it?” asked Madge. “Or is it one of those things one has to say?” They looked at one another, and then beyond the sheltering evergreens and the wide lawns to where the great square house seemed to be listening.!

She glanced round. There was no sign of the returning waiter. She bent over him and kissed him. “Oh, brains aren’t everything,” answered Madge. “Some of the worst rotters the world has ever been cursed with have been brainy enough—men and women. We make too much fuss about brains; just as once upon a time we did about mere brute strength, thinking that was all that was needed to make a man great. Brain is only muscle translated into civilization. That’s not going to save us.”

“Oh, give the devil his due, you fellows,” he said. “War isn’t a pretty game, but it does make for courage. We all know that. And things even finer than mere fighting pluck. There was a man in my company, a Jacques Decrusy. He was just a stupid peasant lad. We were crowded into one end of the trench, about a score of us. The rest of it had fallen in, and we couldn’t move. And a bomb dropped into the middle of us; and the same instant that it touched the ground Decrusy threw himself flat down upon it and took the whole of it into his body. There was nothing left of him but scraps. But the rest of us got off. Nobody had drugged him to do that. There isn’t one of us who was in that trench that will not be a better man to the end of his days, remembering how Jacques Decrusy gave his life for ours.” “I know he’ll come back,” he said. “I won’t tell you why I am so sure. Perhaps you wouldn’t believe.” He was still holding her hands, looking into her eyes. Joan told her plans. “You’ll be able to get along without me for a little while?” she asked doubtfully.