Madge was of opinion that the world would have had enough of war.  Not armies but whole peoples would be involved this time.  The lesson would be driven home.

“Oh, yes, we shall have had enough of it,” agreed Flossie, “by the time we’ve paid up.  There’s no doubt of that.  What about our children?  I’ve just left young Frank strutting all over the house and flourishing a paper knife.  And the servants have had to bar the kitchen door to prevent his bursting in every five minutes and attacking them.  What’s he going to say when I tell him, later on, that his father and myself have had all the war we want, and have decided there shall be no more?  The old folks have had their fun.  Why shouldn’t I have mine?  That will be his argument.”

“You can’t do it,” she concluded, “unless you are prepared to keep half the world’s literature away from the children, scrap half your music, edit your museums and your picture galleries; bowdlerize your Old Testament and rewrite your histories.  And then you’ll have to be careful for twenty-four hours a day that they never see a dog-fight.”

Madge still held to her hope.  God would make a wind of reason to pass over the earth.  He would not smite again his people.

“I wish poor dear Sam could have been kept out of it,” said Flossie.  She wiped her eyes and finished her tea.

Joan had arranged to leave on the Monday.  She ran down to see Mary Stopperton on the Saturday afternoon.  Mr. Stopperton had died the year before, and Mary had been a little hurt, divining insincerity in the condolences offered to her by most of her friends.

“You didn’t know him, dear,” she had said to Joan.  “All his faults were on the outside.”

She did not want to talk about the war.

“Perhaps it’s wrong of me,” she said.  “But it makes me so sad.  And I can do nothing.”

She had been busy at her machine when Joan had entered; and a pile of delicate white work lay folded on a chair beside her.

“What are you making?” asked Joan.

The little withered face lighted up.  “Guess,” she said, as she unfolded and displayed a tiny garment.

“I so love making them,” she said.  “I say to myself, ’It will all come right.  God will send more and more of His Christ babies; till at last there will be thousands and thousands of them everywhere; and their love will change the world!’”

Her bright eyes had caught sight of the ring upon Joan’s hand.  She touched it with her little fragile fingers.

“You will let me make one for you, dearie, won’t you?” she said.  “I feel sure it will be a little Christ baby.”

Arthur was still away when she arrived home.  He had gone to Norway on business.  Her father was afraid he would find it difficult to get back.  Telegraphic communication had been stopped, and they had had no news of him.  Her father was worried.  A big Government contract had come in, while many of his best men had left to enlist.