had no thought of yielding. But presently Lola checked him. Holding him off, she looked full into his eyes with a smile of happy anticipation.

"I really believe you understand me!" she cried. "I've been afraid you'd think I was demanding too much, dear. But you do understand, don't you? There are so few who see things as they really are that our responsibility is just that much the greater, isn't it?"

"Yes, Lola," Richard agreed. "I'll admit all that, but still I don't see why we can't kiss each other without making it a matter of ritual. I meant exactly what I said when I called you Jeanne d'Arc," he held her face between his hands as he completed his sentence with marked significance-"but... that little d'Arc girl didn't wear her armor all the time!"

CHAPTER VI

W

I

HILE Lola was dressing for dinner that evening her mother came into the room and carefully adjusted herself in the great arm-chair, The slight form was almost lost in its ample recesses, but Mrs. Stewart required no reinforcing cushions to hold her in position or to enable her to preserve her self-respect. In her generation girls were taught to make use of their backbones and to keep both feet on the ground, and her early education became a habit. A dainty footstool, it must be admitted, filled in the space between Mrs. Stewart's tiny feet and the floor, but this necessity was due to Nature's selection of a diminutive mold in fashioning her attractive personality rather than to any lack of early training.

The gown Mrs. Stewart had selected this evening was organdie of purest white, but scarcely more so than her hair, prematurely turned. Her face was delicately suffused with color, her skin fair and fine in texture, showing but slightly the effect of her daily association with the garden; and the single touch other than white was a large emerald brooch, a family heirloom. Sitting as she was in the great arm-chair, she

made a striking picture against the pink chintz which caused her daughter to regard her with undisguised admiration.

"Mother, dear, you look like one of the Madonna lilies, transplanted from the garden to my chamber. Truly, you are most decorative!"

Mrs. Stewart had not come to Lola's room to be complimented, and her daughter knew it. Her functions in the household were performed quietly, but with a regularity and directness which accomplished results. Lola was fully aware before her mother spoke that her presence at this time predicated a discussion of importance, and during the process of adjustment in the armchair she wondered what the subject was to be.

"I'm troubled about Richard," Mrs. Stewart said bluntly, after acknowledging her daughter's compliment with a smile "He doesn't seem himself at all. Has

anything happened?"

Lola was still under the spell of the conversation she had so recently had, and regretted that her mother's question had not been postponed in the asking. Richard had seemed to be impressed by what she had said, but could he make the application? Until she knew, her reply must be indefinite.

"We are still engaged, if that is what you mean," she said at length.

"When is the wedding to be?"

"Neither one of us is ready to be married yet," she evaded, flushing slightly as she turned back to the mirror and combed her hair. "We were talking it over only this afternoon."

"Does Richard feel as you do about it?"

"Not . . . exactly," Lola admitted. "I'm hoping that he understands better from what I said to him today. Dick has lost faith in everything. He has a wonderful opportunity before him to accomplish a great work if he can be made to see it. I am trying to show it to him."

"Why couldn't you guide him even better if you were married?"

"That is what Dick asks, . . but I know that I'm right. He came home with wonderful ideals, and then he slumped. If we were married now, he would settle down into the same useless routine as the others, and all he gained would be lost. If I can make him see his opportunity, then he will have an incentive. Thus far I haven't been wholly successful. Until then, mother dear, I'm trying to be the little wisp of hay in front of him, to urge him on."

Mrs. Stewart did not respond to the lighter tone in which the girl spoke the last words.

"You are trying to carry the responsibilities of the whole world on your shoulders since you came home," she exclaimed, making no effort to conceal her disapproval. "You are mothering every ex-service man in Norcross, you are sympathizing with all their family troubles, you are worrying over their sick wives and babies, and now you are doing the thinking for Richard .. We have lost the daughter we used to have, Lola, and we miss her sorely."

"Am I so different, mother dear?" Lola exclaimed. The expression Lola surprised on her mother's face

as she turned caused her to lay down the comb and perch herself on the arm of the great chair.

"I didn't realize that I had changed so much," she added.

"Your father and I are most unhappy about it," Mrs. Stewart admitted. "While you were away we were sustained by a certain exhaltation. Our loneliness was part of our contribution, and was partially offset by our pride in the splendid work you were doing. Our hearts have been hungry for you, dear, and that craving still remains unsatisfied. The daughter who went away from us has never returned. Richard must feel it too, and that may be one reason why he has lost faith."

II

Lola could not answer her mother at once. She knew that what had just been said was true. How could she make it clear that the change which had taken place was simply a broadening of her horizon? Up to the time when she left for her work Lola's life had been completely centered in home and parents; now they were but part of the greater life which she saw before her. The new outlook did not lessen her devotion to them, but it did require her to divide her allegiance, and this was what her mother felt. To acknowledge the fact, or to attempt to explain it would only cause greater unhappiness, for not even her parents could understand. No one could understand who had not passed through the fire.

"Mother dear, I didn't realize that I was making