any
intensity, and since Dick made no sign to her, held out no hand, she
tried as much as possible to shut him from her thoughts. Aunt Janet had
died in her sleep the night war was declared; she had never waked to
consciousness. When the doctor, hastily fetched by Uncle John, had
reached her room, she had been already dead--smiling a little, as if the
last dream which had come to haunt her sleep had been a pleasant one.

"Joy killed her," the nurse declared. Certainly she lay as if very
content and untroubled.

"I believe," Miss Abercrombie told Joan, "that she was only staying
alive to see you. My dear, you must not blame yourself in any way; she
is so much better out of it all."

"No, I don't blame myself," Joan answered. "We had made friends before
she died; there isn't a wall between us any longer."

The villagers ransacked their gardens to send flowers to the funeral.
Aunt Janet's grave was heaped up with them, but in a day or two they
withered, and old Jim carried them away on his leaf heap. After that
every week Joan took down just a handful and laid them where she
thought the closed hands would be, and, because in so doing she seemed
to draw a little closer to Aunt Janet, and through Aunt Janet to the
great God beyond, her thoughts would turn into prayer as she stood by
the grave. "Dear God, keep him always safe," she would whisper. Then
like a formless flash of light the word "England" would steal across her
prayer; she did not need to put the feeling into words; just like an
offering she laid it before her thought of God and knew its meaning
would be understood. So thousands of men and women pray, brought by a
sense of their own helplessness in this great struggle near to the
throne of God. And always the name of England whispers across their
prayers.

Just when the battle of the Marne was at its turning-point Dick got his
orders to go. He was given under a week to get ready in, the unit, a
field hospital, was to start on Saturday and the order came on Monday.
One more day had to be put in at the recruiting depot; he could not
leave them in the lurch; Tuesday he spent getting his kit together,
Wednesday evening saw him down at Sevenoaks.

As once before, Mabel was at the station to meet him. "It's come, then,"
she said. "Tom is wild with envy. Age, you know, limits him to a
volunteer home defence league."

"Bad luck," answered Dick. "Of course I am very bucked to be really
going, Mabel. It is not enl