ight face of his son.

Elizabeth too went to her room. On her table lay the _Times_. She
took it up and read the telegrams again. Raid and counter-raid all
along the front--and in every letter and telegram the shudder of the
nearing event, ghastly hints of that incredible battlefield to come,
that hideous hurricane of death in which Europe was to see once more
her noblest and her youngest perish.

'Oh, why, why am I a woman?' she clasped her hands above her head in
a passion of revolt. 'What does one's own life matter? Why waste a
thought--an hour upon it!'

In a second she was at her table putting together the notes she had
made that morning in the wood. About a hundred and fifty more ash
marked in that wood alone!--thanks to Sir Henry. She rang up Captain
Dell, and made sure that they would be offered that night direct to
the Government timber department--the Squire's ash, for greater
haste, having been now expressly exempted from the general contract.
Canadians were coming down to fell them at once. They must be
housed. One of the vacant farms, not yet let, was to be got ready
for them. She made preliminary arrangements by telephone. Then,
after a hasty lunch, at which the Squire did not appear, and Mrs.
Gaddesden was more than usually languid and selfish, Elizabeth
rushed off to the village on her bicycle. The hospital Commandant
was waiting for her, with such workpeople as could be found, and the
preparation of the empty house for fifty more beds was well begun.
Elizabeth was frugal, but resolute, with the Squire's money. She had
leave to spend. But she would not abuse her power; and all through
her work she was conscious of a queer remorseful gratitude towards
the man in whose name she was acting.

Then she bicycled to the School, where a group of girls whom she
had captured for the land were waiting to see her. Their uniforms
were lying ready on one of the schoolroom tables. She helped the
girls to put them on, laughing, chatting, admiring--ready besides
with a dozen homely hints on how to keep well--how to fend for
themselves, perhaps in a lonely cottage--how to get on with the
farmer--above all, how to get on with the farmer's wife. Her
sympathy made everything worth while--put colour and pleasure into
this new and strange adventure, of women going out to break up and
plough and sow the ancient land of our fathers, which the fighting
men had handed over to them. Elizabeth decked the task with honour,
so t