when the message is finished."

"Isn't it possible," said Natalie, recalling a headline from the evening
paper, "that the House may cause an indefinite delay?"

And, as usual, Clayton wondered at the adroitness with which, in the
talk that followed, she escaped detection.

They sat long at the table, rather as though they clung together. And
Nolan insisted on figuring the cost of war in money.

"Queer thing," he said. "In ancient times the cost of war fell almost
entirely on the poor. But it's the rich who will pay for this war. All
taxation is directed primarily against the rich."

"The poor pay in blood," said Audrey, rather sharply. "They give their
lives, and that is all they have."

"Rich and poor are going to do that, now," old Terry broke in. "Fight
against it all you like, you members of the privileged class, the draft
is coming. This is every man's war."

But Clayton Spencer was watching Natalie. She had paled and was
fingering her liqueur-glass absently. Behind her lowered eyelids he
surmised that again she was planning. But what? Then it came to him,
like a flash. Old Terry had said the draft would exempt married men. She
meant to marry Graham to a girl she detested, to save him from danger.

Through it all, however, and in spite of his anger and apprehension,
he was sorry for her. Sorry for her craven spirit. Sorry even with an
understanding that came from his own fears. Sorry for her, that she
had remained an essential child in a time that would tax the utmost
maturity. She was a child. Even her selfishness was the selfishness of
a spoiled child. She craved things, and the spirit, the essence of life,
escaped her.

And beside him was Audrey, valiant-eyed, courageous, honest. Natalie and
Audrey! Some time during the evening his thoughts took this form: that
there were two sorts of people in the world: those who seized their own
happiness, at any cost; and those who saw the promised land from a far
hill, and having seen it, turned back.

CHAPTER XXXI

Graham was waiting in Clayton's dressing-room when he went up-stairs.
Through the closed door they could hear Natalie's sleepy and rather
fretful orders to her maid. Graham rose when he entered, and threw away
his cigaret.

"I guess it has come, father."

"It looks like it."

A great wave of tenderness for the boy flooded over him. That tall,
straight body, cast in his own mold, but young, only ready to live, that
was to be cast into the