the final reckoning is over. And
whichever it is--the quiet, solitary grave with the cross above it and
the wild flowers blooming freshly underneath the crumbling walls of a
town that was; or the taking up again of the work so long
neglected--the office or the ranch, the railway in Yukon or the rubber
in Malay--whichever it is, he has played the great game well. To him
the great reward. . . .

And the women? the women who have suffered and endured with their
men--more than their men. To some the great reunion, the blessed
feeling that it is over. Never again will he go into the great
unknown; never again that clutching terror of the telegraph boy. He
has come back, and there shall be no more parting. The joy bells will
be ringing out: the war will be over--won.

Thus shall it be for some.

And for the others. . . .

It is not for me to comfort: there are things too deep for the written
word. Only one thing I say, and I say it with a full sense of its
pitiful inadequacy. When the joy bells do ring out, and in the ringing
seem to mock so hideously the empty chair, the voice for ever silent,
then in that bitter moment, remember one thing. Somewhere or other, in
the Soldier's Valhalla, he is waiting for you--waiting with a trusty
band of friends, happy, contented, proud. He was glad to pay that
final price; he knows now, where all is clear, that it was necessary.
He would have you know it too. . . .

_For except a grain of wheat fall into the ground and die. . . ._

***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK NO MAN'S LAND***

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