'Don't--don't talk of them to-night!'--she said passionately--'not
to-night--just to-night, George!'

And she stooped impetuously to lay her hand on his lips. He kissed the
hand, held it, and remained silent, his eyes fixed upon the lake. On
that day week he would probably just have rejoined his regiment. It was
somewhere in the neighbourhood of Bailleul. Hot work, he heard, was
expected. There was still a scandalous shortage of ammunition--and if
there was really to be a 'push,' the losses would be appalling. Man
after man that he knew had been killed within a week--two or three
days--twenty-four hours even!--of rejoining. Supposing that within a
fortnight Nelly sat here, looking at this lake, with the War Office
telegram in her hand--'Deeply regret to inform you, etc.' This was not a
subject on which he had ever allowed himself to dwell, more than in his
changed circumstances he was bound to dwell. Every soldier, normally,
expects to get through. But of course he had done everything that was
necessary for Nelly. His will was in the proper hands; and the night
before their wedding he had written a letter to her, to be given her if
he fell. Otherwise he had taken little account of possible death; nor
had it cost him any trouble to banish the thought of it.

But the beauty of the evening--of this old earth, which takes no account
of the perishing of men--and Nelly's warm life beside him, hanging upon
his, perhaps already containing within it the mysterious promise of
another life, had suddenly brought upon him a tremor of soul--an inward
shudder. Did he really believe in existence after death--in a meeting
again, in some dim other scene, if they were violently parted now? He
had been confirmed while at school. His parents were Church people of a
rather languid type, and it seemed the natural thing to do. Since then
he had occasionally taken the Communion, largely to please an elder