“I am not so sure that I do.  Down deep we’d resent it if we were not applauded, shouldn’t we?”

Randy laughed.  “I believe we should.”

“I fancy that when we’ve been home for a time, we may feel somewhat bitter if we find that our pedestals are knocked from under us.  Our people don’t worship long.  They have too much to think of.  They’ll put up some arches, and a few statues and build tribute houses in a lot of towns, and then they’ll go on about their business, and we who have fought will feel a bit blank.”

Randy laughed, “you haven’t any illusions about it, have you?”

“No, but you and I know that it’s all right however it goes.”

Randy, standing very straight, looked out over the valley where the river showed through the rain like a silver thread.  “Well, we didn’t do it for praise, did we?”

“No, thank God.”

Their eyes were seeing other things than these quiet hills.  Things they wanted to forget.  But they did not want to forget the high exaltation which had sent them over, or the quiet conviction of right which had helped them to carry on.  What the people at home might do or think did not matter.  What mattered was their own adjustment to the things which were to follow.

Randy went up-stairs, took off his uniform, bathed and came down in the garments of peace.

“Glad to get out of your uniform?” the Major asked.

“I believe I am.  Perhaps if I’d been an officer, I shouldn’t.”

“Everybody couldn’t be.  I’ve no doubt you deserved it.”

“I could have pulled wires, of course, before I went over, but I wouldn’t.”

From somewhere within the big house came the reverberation of a
Japanese gong.

Randy rose.  “I’m going over to lunch.  I’d rather face guns, but Mother will like it.  You can have yours here.”

“Not if I know it,” the Major rose, “I’m going to share the fatted calf.”

VI

It was late that night when the Major went to bed.  The feast in Randy’s honor had lasted until ten.  There had been the shine of candles, and the laughter of the women, the old Judge’s genial humor.  Through the windows had come the fragrance of honeysuckle and of late roses.  Becky had sung for them, standing between two straight white candles.

  “In the beauty of the lilies, Christ was born across the sea,
  With the glory in his bosom which transfigures you and me. 
  As he died to make men holy, let us die to make men free
  While God is marching on——­”

The last time the Major had heard a woman sing that song had been in a little French town just after the United States had gone into the war.  She was of his own country, red-haired and in uniform.  She had stood on the steps of a stone house and weary men had clustered about her—­French, English, Scotch, a few Americans.  Tired and spent, they had gazed up at her as if they drank her in.  To them she was more than a singing woman.  She was the daughter of a nation of dreamers, the daughter of a nation which made its dreams come true!  Behind her stood a steadfast people, and—­God was marching on——!