"I can't help it, Ellen. He'll be waiting. Great Heavens! I've been through a hundred raids. They've tried to blow us up every night. . . ."
She had taken his hand now and was pleading anxiously. "But this is different."
Fergus laughed. "It is different," he said. "There's not one chance in a million here. . . ."
Callendar merely smiled, as if to confirm the statement of Fergus that it was ridiculous to suppose there were any danger. He had, of course, no reason for wanting him to remain. It was Fergus who won in the end, merely by persistence—a strange thing, for usually it was the strong-minded Ellen who had her way. To-night he was firm and certain of his purpose. She thought perhaps that it was the war, the years that had passed since she last saw him, which had so hardened him and given strength to his will.
She went with him to the door and on the stairs, when they had turned out of the big room, she said, "You are not going back to the front to-morrow?"
"No. I shall come back here. I shall be in Paris for a week. Perhaps I'll spend a night or two with you here."
In their manner there was still an air of strangeness and formality, as if Callendar had in some way followed them out of the room and walked between them up the polished stairs. She helped him into his greatcoat and kissed him affectionately.
"To-morrow," she said, "it will be better. We can be alone." And then in a low voice she added, as if in explanation, "His permission is over to-morrow."
Extinguishing the candles, Fergus opened the door and looked out. The rain had ceased and far above them beyond the roofs of the houses on the opposite side of the street, the searchlights fingered a sky that, save for one or two clouds, was blue and luminous like the street lamps.
"Look," said Fergus, softly. "They've spotted one of them." And they both stood in the open door fascinated by the sight of a
