y-five thousand?" said Lloyd. "Oh, that is just
sentimental rot. If a man was really needed, he would go; but if not,
why should he? There's no use getting rattled over this thing. Besides,
somebody's got to keep things going here. I think that is a fine British
motto that they have adopted in England, 'Business as usual.'"

"'Business as usual!'" exclaimed Jane in a tone of unutterable contempt.
"I think I must be going home, Lloyd," she added. "Can you take me?"

"What's the rush, Jane? It is early yet. Let's take a turn out to the
Park."

But Jane insisted on going home. Never before in all her life had she
found herself in a mood in which she could with difficulty control her
speech. She could not understand how it was that Lloyd Rushbrooke, whom
she had always greatly liked, should have become at once distasteful to
her. She could hardly bear the look upon his handsome face. His clever,
quick-witted fun, which she had formerly enjoyed, now grated horribly.
Of all the college boys in her particular set, none was more popular,
none better liked, than Lloyd Rushbrooke. Now she was mainly conscious
of a desire to escape from his company. This feeling distressed her. She
wanted to be alone that she might think it out. That was Jane's way. She
always knew her own mind, could always account for her emotions, because
she was intellectually honest and had sufficient fortitude to look facts
in the face. At the door she did not ask even her friend, Ethel, to come
in with her. Nor did she make excuse for omitting this courtesy. That,
too, was Jane's way. She was honest with her friends as with herself.
She employed none of the little fibbing subterfuges which polite manners
approve and which are employed to escape awkward situations, but which,
of course, deceive no one. She was simple, sincere, direct in her mental
and moral processes, and possessed a courage of the finest quality.
Under ordinary circumstances she would have cleared up her thinking
and worked her soul through the mist and stress of the rough weather
by talking it over with her father or by writing a letter to Larry. But
during the days of the past terrible week she had discovered that her
father, too, was tempest-tossed to an even greater degree than she was
herself; and somehow she had no heart to write to Larry. Indeed, she
knew not what to say. Her whole world was in confusion.

And in Winnipeg there were many like her. In every home, while faces
carrie