had always been of a sporting type! As for himself, he had given a
motor ambulance, read the papers till he was sick of them, passed
through much anxiety, invested in War Bonds, bought no clothes,
lost seven pounds in weight; he didn't know what more he could
have done at his age. Indeed, it struck him that he and his family
had taken this war very differently to that affair with the Boers,
which had been supposed to tax all the resources of the Empire. In
that old war, of course, his nephew Val Dartie had been wounded,
that fellow Jolyon's first son had died of enteric, "the Dromios"
had gone out on horses, and June had been a nurse; but all that
had seemed in the nature of a portent, while in THIS war everybody
had done "their bit," so far as he could make out, as a matter of
course. It seemed to show the growth of something or other--or
perhaps the decline of something else. Had the Forsytes become
less individual, or more Imperial, or less provincial? Or was it
simply that one hated Germans?... Why didn't Fleur come, so that
he could get away? He saw those three return together from the
other room and pass back along the far side of the screen. The boy
was standing before the Juno now. And, suddenly, on the other side
of her, Soames saw--his daughter with eyebrows raised, as well
they might be. He could see her eyes glint sideways at the boy,
and the boy look back at her. Then Irene slipped her hand through
his arm, and drew him on. Soames saw him glancing round, and Fleur
looking after them as the three went out.

A voice said cheerfully: "Bit thick, isn't it, sir?"

The young man who had handed him his handkerchief was again
passing. Soames nodded.