world. She told me to go to my camp, wherever that was, and sleep
myself sober. The square-jawed woman said I looked like a fool
sitting there. I did feel ashamed, and I reckon I did look like
a fool--a man generally does in a fix like that. I felt like one,
anyway. I got up and walked away, and it hurt me so much that I went
over to West Bourke and went to the dogs properly for a fortnight, and
lost twenty quid on a game of draughts against a blindfold player.
Now both those women had umbrellas, but I'm not sure to this day which
of 'em it was that gave me the poke. It wouldn't have mattered much
anyway. I haven't borrowed one of Bret Harte's books since."

Jake reflected a while. "The worst of it was," he said ruefully,
"that I wasn't sure that the girl or the woman didn't see through me,
and that worried me a bit. You never can tell how much a woman
suspects, and that's the worst of 'em. I found that out after I got
married."

The Pretty Girl in the Army grew pale and thin and bigger-eyed. The
women said it was a shame, and that she ought to be sent home to her
friends, wherever they were. She was laid up for two or three days,
and some of the women cooked delicacies and handed 'em over the
barracks fence, and offered to come in and nurse her; but the square
woman took washing home and nursed the girl herself.

The Pretty Girl still sold _War Crys_ and took up collections,
but in a tired, listless, half shamed-faced way. It was plain that
she was tired of the Army, and growing ashamed of the Salvationists.
Perhaps she had come to see things too plainly.

You see, the Army does no good out back in Australia--except from a