her country, that the man she loved had been cashiered for cowardice.

The knowledge almost crushed her, and she sometimes wondered if there
could be a keener suffering, in the whole gamut of human pain, than that
which a woman bears whose high pride in her lover has been laid utterly
in the dust.

The dread of danger, separation--even death itself--were not comparable
with it. Sara envied the women whose men were killed in action. At
least, they had a splendid memory to hold which nothing could ever soil
or take away.

Sometimes her thoughts wandered fugitively to Tim. Surely here was his
chance to break from the bondage his mother had imposed upon him! He had
not written to her of late, but she felt convinced that she would have
heard from Elisabeth had he volunteered. She was a little puzzled over
his silence and inaction. He had seemed so keen last winter at Barrow,
when together they had discussed this very subject of soldiering. Could
it be that now, when the opportunity offered, Tim was--evading it? But
the thought was dismissed almost as swiftly as it had arisen, and Sara
blushed scarlet with shame that the bare suspicions should have crossed
her mind, even for an instant, recognizing it as the outcrop of that
bitter knowledge which had cut at the very roots of her belief in men's
courage.

And there were men around her whose readiness to make the great
sacrifice combated the poison of one man's failure. Daily she heard of
this or that man whom she knew, either personally or by name, having
volunteered and been accepted, and very often she had to listen to Miles
Herrick's fierce rebellion against the fact that he was ineligible, and
endeavour to console him.

But it was Audrey Maynard who plumbed the full depths of bitterness
in Herrick's heart. She had been teaching him to knit, and he was
floundering through the intricacies of turning his first heel when one
day he surprised her by hurling the sock, needles and all, to the other
end of the room.

"There's work for a man when his country's at war! My God! Audrey,
I don't know how I'm going to bear it--to lie here on my couch,
knitting--_knitting!_--when men are out there dying! Why won't they take
a lame man? Can't a lame man fire a gun--and then die like the rest of
'em?"

Audrey looked at him pitifully.

"My dear, war takes only the best--the youngest and the fittest. But
there's plenty of work for the women and men at home."

"For the women and