s, men with cradles over them
betokening mangled limbs, men recovering from operations, chiefly the
picking of bits of shrapnel and splinters of bone from shattered arms
and legs; men with pale faces, patient eyes, and with cheery smiles
round their lips when we passed by. A gramophone at the end of the room
was grinding out a sentimental tune to which all were listening with
rapt enjoyment. I asked one man, among others, how he was faring. He
was getting on fine. With the death-rattle in his throat the wounded
British soldier invariably tells you that he is getting on fine.

"And ain't these roses lovely? Makes the place look like a garden. And
that music--seems appropriate, don't it, sir?"

I asked what the gramophone was playing. He looked respectfully shocked.

"Why, it's 'The Rosary,' sir."

After we had left him, Betty said:

"That's the third time they've asked for it to-day. They've got mixed
up with the name, you see. They're beautiful children, aren't they?"

I should have called them sentimental idiots, but Betty saw much
clearer than I did. She accompanied me back to the corridor and to the
Committee Room door. I was a quarter of an hour late.

"I've kept the precious Rayon d'Ors for myself," she said. "How could
you have the heart to cut them?"

"I would have cut out my heart itself, for the matter of that," said I,
"if it would have done any good."

She smiled in a forlorn kind of way.

"Don't do that, for I shall want it inside you more than ever now. Tell
me, how is Tufton?"

"Tufton--?"

"Yes--Tufton."

I must confess that my mind being so full of Betty, I had clean
forgotten Tufton. But Betty remembered.

I smiled. "He's getting on fine," said I. I reached out my hand and
held her cold, slim fingers. "Promise me one thing, my dear."

"All right," she said.

"Don't overdo things. There's a limit to the power of bearing strain.
As soon as you feel you're likely to go FUT, throw it all up and come
and see me and let us lay our heads together."

"I despise people who go FUT," said Betty.

"I don't," said I.

We nodded a mutual farewell. She opened the Committee Room door for me
and walked down the corridor with a swinging step, as though she would
show me how fully she had made herself mistress of circumstance.

Some evenings later she came in, as usual, unheralded, and established
herself by my chair.

The scents of midsummer came in through the open windows, and there was
a gr