d after that there had been dreadful
fighting, and sometimes in the midst of it the voice of the singing
woman had come back to him, stiffening him to his task.

And here, miles away from that war-swept land, another woman sang. And
there was honeysuckle outside, and late roses--and poppies, and there
was Peace. And the world which had not fought would forget. But the men
who had fought would remember.

He heard Randy's voice, sharp with nerves. "Sing something else, Becky.
We've had enough of war----"

The Major leaned across the table. "When did you last hear that song,
Paine?"

"On the other side, a red-haired woman--whose lover had been killed. I
never want to hear it again----"

"Nor I----"

It was as if they were alone at the table, seeing the things which they
had left behind. What did these people know who had stayed at home? The
words were sacred--not to be sung; to be whispered--over the graves
of--France.

CHAPTER II

STUFFED BIRDS

I

The Country Club was, as Judge Bannister had been the first to declare,
"an excrescence."

Under the old regime, there had been no need for country clubs. The
houses on the great estates had been thrown open for the county families
and their friends. There had been meat and drink for man and beast.

The servant problem had, however, in these latter days, put a curb on
generous impulse. There were no more niggers underfoot, and hospitality
was necessarily curtailed. The people who at the time of the August
Horse Show had once packed great hampers with delicious foods, and who
had feasted under the trees amid all the loveliness of mellow-tinted
hills, now ordered by telephone a luncheon of cut-and-dried courses, and
motored down to eat it. After that, they looked at the horses, and with
the feeling upon them of the futility of such shows yawned a bit. In due
season, they held, the horse would be as extinct as the Dodo, and as
mythical as the Centaur.

The Judge argued hotly for the things which had been. Love of the horse
was bred in the bone of Old Dominion men. He swore by all the gods that
when he had to part with his bays and ride behind gasoline, he would be
ready to die.

Becky agreed with her grandfather. She adored the old traditions, and
she adored the Judge. She spent two months of every year with him in his
square brick house in Albemarle surrounded by unprofitable acres. The
remaining two months of her vacation were given to her mother's fa