They laughed.  Zelda was the daughter of a general, and could say very much what she pleased and be laughed at as amusing.

It came to Katie in what large measure they all could do very much as they pleased.  It was a game they played, and great liberty was accorded them in that game so long as they took their liberty in accordance with the prescribed rules of that game.  But they guarded their own privileges with an intolerance for all those outside their game who would take privileges of their own.  That—­labeled a respect for good form—­was in reality their method of self-defense.

She looked at Zelda Fraser—­Zelda with her bold black eyes, her red cheeks which she made still redder—­and her hair—­as long as people were “wearing” hair Zelda wore a little more than any one else.  Nothing about her suggested anything so redeeming as a quest for Something Somewhere.  No veiled splendor of a dream hovered tenderly over Zelda.  Watching her as she bantered with Major Barrett it grew upon Katie as one of the grotesque things of the world that Zelda should be within and Ann without.

Major Barrett had remained.  It was Ann who had gone.  Yet it was Ann had dreamed the dream.  He who had made the “excursion” despoiling the dream.  It was Ann had been “called.”  He who had preyed upon—­cheated—­that call.

Yet she had not sent him away.  She was too much in the game for that.  She had not seemed to have the power.  Certainly she had not had the wit nor the courage.  He had remained and taken command.  She had done as he told her.

He was smiling approvingly upon her now, manifestly proud of the way Katie was playing the game.

Seeing it as a thing to win his approval she could with difficulty continue it.  She was thankful that the dinner itself had drawn to a close.

Later, on the porch, Caroline Osborne asked for Ann.  Zelda and Major Darrett and Harry Prescott were in the group at the time.

“You mean she is not coming back?” she pursued in response to Katie’s statement that Ann had been called away.

“I don’t know,” said Katie.  “I’m afraid not.”

“Who is she, Katie?” Zelda asked.

“No one you know.”

Zelda turned to Prescott.  “You know her?”

“Yes,” he said.  His voice told Katie how hard he was finding it just then to play the game.

“Like her?”

“Yes,” he replied.

Zelda threw back her head in an impertinent way of hers that was called engaging.  “Love her?”

He stepped nearer Katie, as if for protection.  His smile was a dead smile.

“Really, Zelda,” said Katie, in laughing protest.

“I just wondered,” said Zelda, “if she was going to marry into the army.”

Katie saw Major Darrett’s smile.

“If she did,” she said, “the army would gain something that might do it good.”

Major Darrett was staring at her speechlessly.  Harry gratefully.  “You’re very fond of her?” said Caroline Osborne in her sweet-toned way.