wind would let
them talk.

They turned their backs on the storm and ran down the hill towards
Merrow. Gerda, light as a leaf on the wind, could have run all the way
back; Barry, fit and light too, but fifteen years ahead of her, fell
after five minutes into a walk.

Then they could talk a little.

"And to-morrow I shall be plugging in town," sighed Barry.

Gerda always went straight to her point.

"May I come into your office, please, and learn the work?"

He smiled down at her. Splendid child!

"Why, rather. Do you mean it? When do you want to come?"

"To-morrow?"

He laughed. "Good. I thought you meant in the autumn. ... To-morrow
by all means, if you will. As a matter of fact we're frightfully
short-handed in the office just now. Our typist has crocked, and we
haven't another yet, so people have to type their own letters."

"I can do the typing," said Gerda, composedly. "I can type quite well."

"Oh, but that'll be dull for you. That's not what you want, is it?
Though, if you want to learn about the work, it's not a bad way ... you
get it all passing through your hands.... Would you really take on that
job for a bit?"

Gerda nodded.

They were rapid and decided people; they did not beat about the bush. If
they wanted to do a thing and there seemed no reason why not, they did
it.

"That's first-class," said Barry. "Give it a trial, anyhow.... Of course
you'll be on trial too; we may find it doesn't work. If so, there are
plenty of other jobs to be done in the office. But that's what we most
want at the moment."

Barry had a way of assuming that people would want, naturally, to do the
thing that most needed doing.

Gerda's soul sang and whistled down the whistling wind. It wasn't over,
then: it was only beginning. The W.E.A. was splendid; work was splendid;
Barry Briscoe was splendid; life was splendid. She was sorry for Kay at
Cambridge, Kay who was just off on a reading party, not helping in the
world's work but merely getting education. Education was inspiring in
connection with Democracy, but when applied to oneself it was dull.

The rain was lessening. It fell on their heads more lightly; the wind was
like soft wet kisses on their backs, as they tramped through Merrow, and
up the lane to Windover.

3

They all sat round the tea-table, and most of them were warm and sleepy
from Sunday afternoon by the fire, but Barry and Gerda were warm and
tingling from walking in the storm. Some people