no reason why you shouldn't have supper. Trouble always sets heavy on
a empty stomach."




CHAPTER VII


The fatal accident which Phineas Flathers' misguided patriotism had
precipitated, changed the course of many a life, but to none did it
bring more far-reaching consequences than to the daughter of old Bob
Carsey.

Miss Lady could never clearly recall those first days after her
father's death. They seemed to her a confused nightmare of strange
doctors and nurses, of a strange man hovering between life and death
in the guest-room bed, of strange people coming and going, or sitting
in hushed groups on the stiff horsehair chairs in the hall, waiting
for news. Two facts alone remained fixed in the whirling chaos of
unrealities; her father was dead, and no letter had come from Donald
Morley.

Each day when the mail arrived she roused from her apathy, and with
trembling fingers sorted out the letters, going over them again and
again, and never finding the one she sought. Gradually beneath the
poignant grief for her father, came the dull persistent pain of a
first disillusion. The belief and loyalty with which she had started
out to defend Donald began to weaken before his silence. In his
trouble she had been ready to rush to him, to succor and forgive, but