"None of us do. Do you suppose that the wives and mothers of France ever dreamed that it would be their fort.i.tude which would hold the enemy back?"

"Do you think it did, really?" Jean asked her.

"I know it. It has been a barrier as tangible as a wall of rock."

"You put an awful responsibility upon the women."

"Why not? They are the mothers of men."

They sat down after that; and Jean listened frozenly while Margaret and Derry talked. The children in front of the fire were looking at the pictures in a book which Derry had brought.

Teddy, stretched at length on the rug in his favorite att.i.tude, was reading to Margaret-Mary. His mop of bright hair, his flushed cheeks, his active gestures spoke of life quick in his young body--.

And his father was--dead--!

Oh, oh, Mothers of men--!

CHAPTER XV

HILDA BREAKS THE RULES

It was Dr. McKenzie who told Hilda of Jean's engagement to Derry Drake.

"I thought it best for them not to say anything to the General until he is better. So you may consider it confidential, Hilda."

"Of course."

She had come to his office to help him with his books. The nurse who somewhat inadequately supplied her place was having an afternoon off.

The Doctor had been glad to see her, and had told her so. "I am afraid things are in an awful muddle."

"Not so bad that they can't be straightened out in an hour or two."

"I don't see why you insist upon staying on the General's case. I shouldn't have sent you if I had thought you'd keep at it like this."

"I always keep at things when I begin them, don't I?"

He knew that she did. It was one of the qualities which made her valuable. "I believe that you are staying away to let me see how hard it is to get along without you."

"It wouldn't be a bad idea, but that's not the reason. I am staying because I like the case." She shifted the topic away from herself.

"People will say that Jean has played her cards well."

He blazed, "What do you mean, Hilda?"

"He has a great deal of money."

"What has that to do with it?"

Her smile was irritating. "Oh, I know you are not mercenary. But a million or two won't come amiss in any girl's future--and two country houses, and a house in town."

"You seem to know all about it."

"The General talks a lot--and anyhow, all the world knows it. It's no secret."

"I rather think that Jean doesn't know it. I haven't told her. She realizes that he is rich, but it doesn't seem to have made much impression on her."

"Most people will think she is lucky to have caught him."

"He is not a fish," with rising anger, "and as for Jean, she'd marry him if he hadn't a penny, and you know it, Hilda."

Hilda considered that for a moment. Then she said, "Is it his money or his father's?"

"Belongs to the old man. Derry's mother had nothing but an irreproachable family tree."

Hilda's long hands were clasped on the desk, her eyes were upon them.

"If he shouldn't like his son's marriage, he might make things uncomfortable."

"Why shouldn't he like my Jean?"

"He probably will. But there's always the chance that he may not. He may be more ambitious."

Dr. McKenzie ran his fingers through his crinkled hair. "She's good enough for--a king."

"You think that, naturally, but he isn't the doting father of an only daughter."

"If he thinks that my daughter isn't good enough for his son--"

"You needn't shout at me like that," calmly; "but he knows as well as you do that Derry Drake's millions could get him any girl."

He had a flashing sense of the coa.r.s.e fiber of Hilda's mental make-up.

"My Jean is a well-born and well-bred woman," he said, slowly. "It is a thing that money can't buy."

"Money buys a very good counterfeit. Lots of the women who come here aren't ladies, not in the sense that you mean it, but on the surface you can't tell them apart."

He knew that it was true. No one knows better than a doctor what is beneath the veneer of social convention and personal hypocrisy.

"And as for Jean," her quiet voice a.n.a.lyzed, "what do you know of her, really? You've kept her shut away from the things that could hurt her, but how do you know what will happen when you open the gate?"

Yet Emily had said--? His hand came down on top of the desk. "I think we won't discuss Jean."

"Very well, but you brought it on yourself. And now please go away, I've got to finish this and get back--"

He went reluctantly, and returned to say, "You'll come over again before I sail, and straighten things out for me?"

"Of course."