t was all so utterly different from what she had
expected--so bright, so full of life. These well-fed people they seemed
happy enough. Were they all wrong back home? Was the war the ghastly
thing they thought it?

Long months afterward Sara Lee was to learn that the Savoy was not
London. She was to learn other things--that America knew more, through
a free press, of war conditions than did England. And she was to
learn what never ceased to surprise her--the sporting instinct of the
British which made their early slogan "Business as usual." Business
and pleasure--but only on the surface. Underneath was a dogged and
obstinate determination to make up as soon as possible for the
humiliation of the early days of the war.

Those were the transition days in England. The people were slowly
awaking to the magnitude of the thing that was happening to them. Certain
elements of the press, long under political dominion, were preparing to
come out for a coalition ministry. The question of high-explosive
shells as against shrapnel was bitterly fought, some of the men at home
standing fast for shrapnel, as valuable against German artillery as a
garden hose. Men coming back from the Front were pleading for real help,
not men only, not Red Cross, not food and supplies, but for something
more competent than mere man power to hold back the deluge.

But over it all was that surface cheerfulness, that best-foot-forward
attitude of London. And Sara Lee saw only that, and lost faith. She
had come far to help. But here was food in plenty and bands playing
and smiling men in uniform drinking tea and playing for a little. That,
too, Sara Lee was to understand later; but just then she did not. At
home there was more surface depression. The atrocities, the plight of
the Belgians, the honor list in the _Illustrated London News_--that was
the war to Sara Lee. And here!

But later on, down in a crowded dark little room, things were different.
She was one of a long line, mostly women. They were unhappy and desolate
enough, God knows. They sat or stood with a sort of weary resignation.
Now and then a short heavy man with an upcurled mustache came out and
took in one or two. The door closed. And overhead the band played
monotonously.

It was after seven when Sara Lee's turn came. The heavy-set man spoke
to her in French, but he failed to use a single one of the words she
had memorized.

"Don't you speak any English?" she asked helplessly.

"I d