ve life!" answered Hugo earnestly. "I try to get something out of
every minute of it; if nothing particular, at least the miracle of
living and breathing and thinking and seeing--seeing such beautiful
scenes as this." He looked away toward the glorious landscape. It was
the first time that he had lifted the steady gaze of those studious blue
eyes from Westerling, but directly they were back on duty. "It is
because I love life," he continued, "and think that everybody else must
love life, that I do not want to kill. Because I love my country I know
that others love their country, and I want them to keep their country."

Marta's glance had followed Hugo's into the distance. It still rested
there intently. To Westerling she showed only a profile, with the shadow
of the porch between them and the golden light of receding day in the
background: a golden light on a silhouette of ivory, a silhouette that
you might find without meaning or so full of meaning as to hold an
observer in a quandary as to what she was thinking or whether or not she
was thinking at all.

Westerling had the baffled consciousness of fencing with a culprit at
the bar who had turned adversary. It was the visionary's white logic of
the blue dome against the soldier's material logic of _x_ equals initial
velocity. Here was an incomprehensible mortal who loved life and yet was
ready to die for love of life. Here was love of country that refused to
serve country.

All a pose, a clever bit of acting to play on his feelings through the
presence of a woman, Westerling concluded. And Marta was still looking
at the landscape. Her mind seemed withdrawn from the veranda. Only her
body remained. All the impulse of Westerling's military instinct and
training, rebelling at an abstract ethical controversy with a private
about book heresies that belonged under the censor's ban, called for the
word of authority from the apex of the pyramid to put an end to talk
with an atom at the base. But that profile--that serene ivory in the
golden light, so unlike the Marta of the hotel reception-room--was
compellingly present though her mind were absent. It suggested loss of
temper as the supreme weakness. He had permitted a controversy. He must
argue his man down; he must find his adversary's weak point.

"Your province is one of the most patriotic," he said. "Its people are
of the purest blood of our race. They have always been loyal. They have
always fought determinedly. To no