Page:Man's Country (1923).pdf/326

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called down to earth her restless, romantic spirit. She had learned to be of yse in the world.

But she was still restless, nomadic of disposition. She had established a home for orphaned Belgian children, but had left it for others to manage. She had taken a course and done nursing in the great Red Cross Hospital at Neuilly, near Paris, and then, craving more adventure, had gone to driving ambulance for a British Hospital unit.

George was permitted to see a snapshot of her in uniform, the same trim, graceful figure, but with a rare steadiness in the eyes, a new strength in the pose—or was it the uniform that imparted this? Why not an American uniform? But the Americans had only men driving ambulances.

Nothing was said about Sir Brian; nothing was asked about him. George feared the question—feared a reply that might destroy hope.

He went on to France, a land groaning with war and teeming with the movement of war, yet to his fascinated imagination, it seemed only some small, magic maze in the labyrinths of which he must presently encounter his wife. In this state of mind he indulged day-dreams the absurdity of which made those by which his wife had once been charmed seem like polished diamonds of Aristotelian wisdom.

For instance, he dreamed ridiculously of being