u going to-night?" he asked, sitting down to the table.

"To the armory--basketball game--and dance afterward."

"With whom?"

"With Harry. I suppose that pleases you, big brother?"

"Yes, it does. I like him. I wish he'd take you out oftener."

"_Take_ me! Hot dog! He'd kill himself to take me all the time. But
Harry's slow. He bores me. Then he hasn't got a car."

"Lorna, you may as well know now that I'm going to stop your car
rides," said Lane, losing his patience.

"You are _not_," she retorted, and in the glint of the eyes meeting
his, Lane saw his defeat. His patience was exhausted, his fear almost
verified. He did not mince words. With his mother standing
open-mouthed and shocked, Lane gave his sister to understand what he
thought of automobile rides, and that as far as she was concerned they
had to be stopped. If she would not stop them out of respect to her
mother and to him, then he would resort to other measures. Lorna
bounced up in a fury, and in the sharp quarrel that followed, Lane
realized he was dealing with flint full of fire. Lorna left without
finishing her supper.

"Daren, that's not the way," said his mother, shaking her head.

"What is the way, mother?" he asked, throwing up his hands.

"I don't know, unless it's to see her way," responded the mother.
"Sometimes I feel so--so old-fashioned and ignorant before Lorna.
Maybe she is right. How can we tell? What makes all the young girls
like that?"

What indeed, wondered Lane! The question had been hammering at his
mind for over a month. He went back to bed, weary and dejected,
suffering spasms of pain, like blades, through his lungs, and grateful
for the darkness. Almost he wished it was all over--this ordeal. How
puny his efforts! Relentlessly life marched on. At midnight he was
still fighting his pangs, still unconquered. In the night his dark
room was not empty. There were faces, shadows, moving images and
pictures, scenes of the war limned against the blackness. At last he
rested, grew as free from pain as he ever grew, and slept. In the
morning it was another day, and the past was as if it were not.

May the first dawned ideally springlike, warm, fresh, fragrant, with
birds singing, sky a clear blue, and trees budding green and white.

Lane yielded to an impulse that had grown stronger of late. His steps
drew him to the little drab house where Mel Iden lived with her aunt.
On the way, which led past a hedge, Lane gathered a bunch