.' Well, now you've seen him. And I guess
you've seen in the same minute that our experiment has failed."

"I'm--afraid that's true, Tony!" I sighed. "I can't help it! It wouldn't
be fair to you for us to go on as we are. I shall have to break my word
to you, if I'm to be faithful to myself."

"You won't be breaking any old word!" he said. "It was never an
iron-clad promise. I teased you till you agreed to try how the thing
would work. It's been my fault all through, and now I'll take my
medicine. Our engagement was never insured against war risks, and when I
get back my senses I'm going to be glad you saw March before it was too
late. I--brought you two together, sort of inadvertently, as you might
say, didn't I? But, honest Injun, Peggy, I'd do the thing over again,
knowing all I know. I only wish--yes, before the Lord I _do_ wish--that
good may come of it to you both."

"You're an angel, Tony, a real angel!" I almost sobbed. "But you needn't
think that anything will 'come of it' in the way you mean, because it
won't. I don't delude myself. I don't even hope. All the same, I must be
true--to my own heart. And I beg of you to forgive me because I didn't
know it well enough before."

"There isn't any question of forgiveness," said he, with his head up,
and his nice Billiken face very pink. "I bless you--bless you for all
you've been or done to me. And I wouldn't forget or undo anything if I
could, you can bet your life on that. I think I could bear the whole
business like a man, if I could stay right here and see you through.
But--there's mater and Milly to think of--and the regiment.
And--and--oh, well, life's just one damn thing after another!"

Mrs. Dalziel and Milly came and pleaded with me after that, and tried to
frighten me into going with them; but, as Milly burst out desperately at
last, I was "as hard as nails." Tony had told them nothing, I found,
about the failure of our experiment or the identity of Monsieur Mars. I
well understood why, and was grateful--grateful for that and for many
things; most of all for bringing me to Belgium, and neither grudging nor
regretting what he had done. So, as a lover, Tony went out of my life;
but as a friend, he never can go.

I had no time to cry or feel lonely, or tell myself what a beast I'd
been, after the three had reluctantly left me to my fate; for when I
went back on duty after the good-byes, it was to find that I had been
sent for to hasten to the principal w