should deal with him. That
would have been the proper procedure. Norman's performance was utterly
improper and scandalous and outrageous; but, by George,"--the doctor
threw back his head and chuckled, "by George, Anne-girl, it was
satisfying."

CHAPTER XXI

"LOVE AFFAIRS ARE HORRIBLE"

Ingleside
20th June 1916

"We have been so busy, and day after day has brought such exciting
news, good and bad, that I haven't had time and composure to write in
my diary for weeks. I like to keep it up regularly, for father says a
diary of the years of the war should be a very interesting thing to
hand down to one's children. The trouble is, I like to write a few
personal things in this blessed old book that might not be exactly what
I'd want my children to read. I feel that I shall be a far greater
stickler for propriety in regard to them than I am for myself!

"The first week in June was another dreadful one. The Austrians seemed
just on the point of overrunning Italy: and then came the first awful
news of the Battle of Jutland, which the Germans claimed as a great
victory. Susan was the only one who carried on. 'You need never tell me
that the Kaiser has defeated the British Navy,' she said, with a
contemptuous sniff. 'It is all a German lie and that you may tie to.'
And when a couple of days later we found out that she was right and
that it had been a British victory instead of a British defeat, we had
to put up with a great many 'I told you so's,' but we endured them very
comfortably.

"It took Kitchener's death to finish Susan. For the first time I saw
her down and out. We all felt the shock of it but Susan plumbed the
depths of despair. The news came at night by 'phone but Susan wouldn't
believe it until she saw the Enterprise headline the next day. She did
not cry or faint or go into hysterics; but she forgot to put salt in
the soup, and that is something Susan never did in my recollection.
Mother and Miss Oliver and I cried but Susan looked at us in stony
sarcasm and said, 'The Kaiser and his six sons are all alive and
thriving. So the world is not left wholly desolate. Why cry, Mrs. Dr.
dear?' Susan continued in this stony, hopeless condition for
twenty-four hours, and then Cousin Sophia appeared and began to condole
with her.

"'This is terrible news, ain't it, Susan? We might as well prepare for
the worst for it is bound to come. You said once--and well do I
remember the words, Susan Baker--that you had com