Hayden had become more and more involved in war work; he was in constant demand, he was sent hither and thither to attend to this and that troublesome affair.  Twice he had to go abroad.  At home, Anne’s work called her into the homes of soldiers; she came in close contact with the families of the men who were fighting, and what she saw she was never able to forget.  She got down to bed-rock.  Her own early life made her acutely understanding.  Where Marcia would have been blind, Anne saw; where the woman who had never known poverty and hardship would have remained deaf, the woman who had slaved in the Baxters’ kitchen, who had been an overworked, unloved child in bondage, heard, and understood to the core of her soul what she was hearing.  These voices from the depths were not inarticulate to Anne!

When Berkeley came back from his second voyage abroad, he was more impatient than she had ever seen him.  The end was in sight then, as he knew, and he saw no reason for further delay.  He urged Anne to marry him.  Why should they waste time?  When he consulted Marcia, she agreed with him.  Everybody, she said, was getting married.  Why shouldn’t he and Anne?  Already the rumor of their engagement had crept out.  There were hints of it in the social chatter of the papers.  Why not announce it formally, and have the marriage follow immediately?

But Anne Champneys found herself in a curious mood.  The nervous strain of war work, perhaps, was accountable.  She meant to marry Berkeley; but she didn’t want to marry him at once.  She did not object to having their engagement announced.  He could shout it from the housetops if that pleased him.  But in the meanwhile she wanted a little rest, a little freedom.  She wished to be fetterless, free to come and go as she pleased.  No work, no interviews, no photographers, no weary hours with dressmakers and tailors.  No envy because Berkeley Hayden was going to marry her, no wearisome comments, idle flattery hiding spite, no gossip violating all privacies.  A raging impatience against it all assailed her.  It seemed to her that she had never been allowed really to think or to act for herself disinterestedly, that she had never been free.  Always she had been in bondage!  Oh, for just a little hour of freedom, in the open, to be just as ordinary and inconspicuous as in her heart of hearts she would have preferred to be, left to herself!

Marcia said her nerves were unstrung, and no wonder, considering how she’d worked, and what she’d seen.  Jason came vigorously to her rescue.  He advised her to go off somewhere and get acquainted with herself.  To drop out of things for a while, and treat herself to the rest she needed.  Cut and run!  Scuttle for cover!

“You’ve been overdoing things, of course.  You’ve been Lady Bountiful, and first-aider, and last-leaver.  Like the Lord and a thumping good lie, you’ve been a very present help in time of trouble.  But there’s such a thing as being too steady on the job.  You need a change of people, scene, and mind.  Take it.”