gram fluttered to the floor, and
David Linton picked it up and read it. He laid the paper on the table
and turned to her, holding out his hands silently, and she came to him
and put her face on his breast, trembling. His arm tightened round
her. So they stood, while the time dragged on.

He put her into a chair at last, and they looked at each other: they
had said no word since that first moment.

"Well," said David Linton slowly, "we knew it might come. And we know
that he died like a man, and that he never shirked. Thank God we had
him, Norah. And thank God my son died a soldier, not a slacker."

CHAPTER XIV

CARRYING ON

After that first terrible evening, during which no one had looked upon
their agony, David Linton and his child took up their life again and
tried to splice the broken ends as best they might. Their guests, who
came down to breakfast nervously, preparing to go away at once, found
them in the dining-room, haggard and worn, but pleasantly courteous;
they talked of the morning's news, of the frost that seemed
commencing, of the bulbs that were sending delicate spear-heads up
through the grass or the bare flower-beds. There were arrangements
for the day to be made for those who cared to ride or drive: the
trains to be planned for a gunner subaltern whose leave was expiring
next day. Everything was quite as usual, outwardly.

"Pretty ghastly meal, what?" remarked the young gunner to a chum, as
they went out on the terrace. "Rather like dancing at a funeral."

Philip Hardress came into the morning-room, where Mr. Linton and Norah
were talking.

"I don't need to tell you how horribly sorry I am," he faltered.

"No--thanks, Phil."

"You--you haven't any details?"

"No."

"Wally will write as soon as he can," Norah added.

"Yes, of course. The others want me to say, sir, of course they will
go away. They all understand. I can go too, just to the hotel. I
can supervise Hawkins from there."

"I hope none of you will think of doing any such thing," David Linton
said. "Our work here is just the same. Jim would never have wished
us not to carry on."

"But----" Hardress began.

"There isn't any 'but.' Norah and I are not going to sit mourning,
with our hands in front of us. We mean to work a bit harder, that's
all. You see"--the ghost of a smile flickered across the face that
had aged ten years in a night--"more than ever now, whatever we do for
a soldier is done for