hael. When the door
closed behind her, she gazed up the wide expanse of platform. She
caught sight of him, but he was well ahead, and he was walking very
quickly. Even if she ran, she doubted if she could catch him. After
the heat of the room, the air was bitingly cold. Margaret did not feel
it; her eyes were trying to keep Michael's khaki-clad figure in sight.

She tried, but failed, for soon he was lost in the crowd of men who
were boarding the train. Bevies of women and girls and children had
gathered on the platform to see their relatives leave for the Front.
Before Margaret's flying feet could overtake Michael he had jumped into
a carriage and was as completely lost to sight as a needle in a stack
of hay. He was a common Tommy, as heavily-laden, Margaret thought, as
an Arab-porter, with his accoutrements of war. All the window seats in
the train had been taken up long before he entered it, so it was quite
impossible for her to distinguish him amongst the late-comers who were
struggling to find even standing-room.

Margaret stood for a moment or two in breathless despair. What could
she do? He was there somewhere, in that very train. She was standing
beside it, and yet she could not even see him. She was only wasting
time; her sense of duty urged her to return to the hungry men in the
refreshment-room. Had she forgotten how eager and longing everyone of
them was for something to drink?

Her conscience might urge her, but for this once she was a human,
love-hungry girl, as eager to speak to her man as the men were to
swallow big mouthfuls of tea. With tear-blinded eyes she saw the train
leave the platform; she had allowed herself that extension of time.
After all, if the soldiers' throats were starved for moisture, had not
the whole of her being suffered a far more acute starvation for many,
many months? Her womanhood was crying out for its rights.

As the end of the train was lost to sight, she turned away. She was
just the girl he had left behind him, forlorn and desolate. A
soldier's wife, who was crying healthily, almost tripped Margaret up as
she swung quickly round. Her baby, a tired little fractious creature,
was in her arms.

As Margaret apologized to her, the idea came to her to ask the woman
where the men in the train were going to.

"Most of them to the Front," the woman said. "I lost my only brother
two months ago, and now my man's gone. Oh, this is a cruel war!" Her
sobs becam