little house, a big and cheery and not over-orderly center. Followed
his going not only quiet, but a wretched tidiness. There was nothing
for Sara Lee to do but to think.

And, in the way of mourning women, things that Uncle James had said
which had passed unheeded came back to her. One of them was when he
had proposed to adopt a Belgian child, and Aunt Harriet had offered
horrified protest.

"All right," he had said. "Of course, if you feel that way about
it--! But I feel kind of mean, sometimes, sitting here doing nothing
when there's such a lot to be done."

Then he had gone for a walk and had come back cheerful enough but rather
quiet.

There was that other time, too, when the German Army was hurling itself,
wave after wave, across the Yser--only of course Sara Lee knew nothing
of the Yser then--and when it seemed as though the attenuated Allied
line must surely crack and give. He had said then that if he were only
twenty years younger he would go across and help.

"And what about me?" Aunt Harriet had asked. "But I suppose I wouldn't
matter."

"You could go to Jennie's, couldn't you?"

There had followed one of those absurd wrangles as to whether or not Aunt
Harriet would go to Jennie's in the rather remote contingency of Uncle
James' becoming twenty years younger and going away.