imes were bad, hard times for
me then. We had always made so much of Christmas, and here was the
third Christmas that our boy had been away. And so I was depressed.
And then, there had been no word for me from John for a day or two. I
was not worried, for I thought it likely that his mother or his
sweetheart had heard, and had not time yet to let me know. But,
whatever the reason, I was depressed and blue, and I could not enter
into the festive spirit that folk were trying to keep alive despite
the war.

I must have been poor company during that ride to Clapham in the
taxicab. We scarcely exchanged a word, my friend and I. I did not
feel like talking, and he respected my mood, and kept quiet himself.
I felt, at last, that I ought to apologize to him.

"I don't know what's the matter with me," I told him. "I simply don't
want to talk. I feel sad and lonely. I wonder if my boy is all right?"

"Of course he is!" my friend told me. "Cheer up, Harry. This is a time
when no news is good news. If anything were wrong with him they'd let
you know."

Well, I knew that, too. And I tried to cheer up, and feel better, so
that I would not spoil the pleasure of the others at Tom Vallance's
house. I tried to picture John as I thought he must be--well, and
happy, and smiling the old, familiar boyish smile I knew so well. I
had sent him a box of cigars only a few days before, and he would be
handing it around among his fellow officers. I knew that! But it was
no use. I could think of John, but it was only with sorrow and
longing. And I wondered if this same time in a year would see him
still out there, in the trenches. Would this war ever end? And so the
shadows still hung about me when we reached Tom's house.

They made me very welcome, did Tom and all his family. They tried to
cheer me, and Tom did all he could to make me feel better, and to
reassure me. But I was still depressed when we left the house and
began the drive back to London.

"It's the holiday--I'm out of gear with that, I'm thinking," I told
my friend.

He was going to join two other friends, and, with them, to see the
New Year in in an old fashioned way, and he wanted me to join them.
But I did not feel up to it; I was not in the mood for anything of
the sort.

"No, no, I'll go home and turn in," I told him. "I'm too dull tonight
to be good company."

He hoped, as we all did, that this New Year that was coming would
bring victory and peace. Peace could not c