of an army contract; and he's going
to marry--the engagement came out just before I left--Bella Stearns."

At these words Mrs. Elmore sat upright,--the only posture in which the
fact could be imagined. "Lily!"

"Oh, I can tell you these are gay times in America," triumphed the young
girl. She now put her hand to her mouth and hid a yawn.

"You're sleepy," said Mrs. Elmore. "Well, you know the way to your room.
You'll find everything ready there, and I shall let you go alone. You
shall commence being at home at once."

"Yes, I _am_ sleepy," assented Lily; and she promptly said her
good-nights and vanished; though a keener eye than Elmore's might have
seen that her promptness had a color--or say light--of hesitation in it.

But he only walked up and down the room, after she was gone, in
unheedful distress. "Gay times in America! Good heavens! Is the child
utterly heartless, Celia, or is she merely obtuse?"

"She certainly isn't at all like Sue," sighed Mrs. Elmore, who had not
had time to formulate Lily's defence. "But she's excited now, and a
little off her balance. She'll be different to-morrow. Besides, all
America seems changed, and the people with it. We shouldn't have noticed
it if we had stayed there, but we feel it after this absence."

"I never realized it before, as I did from her babble! The letters have
told us the same thing, but they were like the histories of other times.
Camps, prisoners, barracks, mutilation, widowhood, death, sudden gains,
social upheavals,--it is the old, hideous story of war come true of our
day and country. It's terrible!"

"She will miss the excitement," said Mrs. Elmore. "I don't know exactly
what we shall do with her. Of course, she can't expect the attentions
she's been used to in Patmos, with those young men."

Elmore stopped, and stared at his wife. "What do you mean, Celia?"

"We don't go into society at all, and she doesn't speak Italian. How
shall we amuse her?"

"Well, upon my word, I don't know that we're obliged to provide her
amusement! Let her amuse herself. Let her take up some branch of study,
or of--of--research, and get something besides 'fun' into her head, if
possible." He spoke boldly, but his wife's question had unnerved him,
for he had a soft heart, and liked people about him to be happy. "We can
show her the objects of interest. And there are the theatres," he added.

"Yes, that is true," said Mrs. Elmore. "We can both go about with her. I
will jus