It wasn't so hard then to go. It was all over in a minute. Nobody hung
round my neck. Even when it came to Mother, whom of course I always
leave till the last, she just gave me one good kiss, with her hands on
my shoulders, and then I jumped on board. The train didn't linger
long, for which I was mighty glad. When it pulled out, and I looked
back at them all standing there--the whole bunch of them--suddenly I
couldn't see them awfully well. But I gave a big wink that cleared my
eyes, and saw that Mother was smiling, just as she always does,
exactly as if I'd been going back to prep-school after my first
vacation home. It wasn't a teary smile, either--it was her very
best.... I see it now, sometimes, when I'm just dropping off to sleep.

I've thought about that send-off a lot since I got away. I've realized
since, more than I did then, that it must have taken just sheer pluck
on all their parts to see it through as they did. Of course, my young
sisters couldn't understand all it meant, but my kid brother's read a
heap, as I easily found out when we talked about it, and I know he had
to do a few swallowings of the throat on the side not to show how he
felt more than he did. As for Grandfather and Grandmother, they went
through the Civil War, and they knew, better than any of us, what
might be ahead. Dad--well--Dad has wonderful control of himself
always, and I should be surprised if I saw his heart on his sleeve at
any time, yet I knew perfectly that he felt the whole thing
tremendously. He was banking on doing his bit in the Home Defence
League, and the Red Cross, and everywhere else he could get his hand
in, and I could tell well enough that he was aching to be in active
service.

But after all, it's the mothers, I think, who do the biggest giving