"Do you think he will be able to do any more fighting? Will he be strong enough?"
"I don't see why. The government won't let him do it, that's all. He can claim a pension and get out of service with an honourable discharge--and maybe a medal. He'll be strong enough, however. That fellow could go on a hike inside of a month."
"I suppose we'll all be going home before long. This war is about over," growled Harbin.
"No sirree! We'll be fighting these fellows for ten years. Ah, there's your daughter, Colonel. Good-day."
With the first returning strength, freed from lassitude and stupor, Graydon began whispering joyous words of love to Jane. His eyes were bright with the gladness that his pain had brought. She checked his weak outbursts at first, but before many days had passed she was obliged to resort to a firmness that shocked him into a resentful silence. She was even harsh in her command. It cut her to the quick to hurt him, but she was steeling herself against the future.
When he was able to walk out in the grounds, she withdrew farther into the background of their daily life. He hungered for her, but she began to avoid him with a strange aloofness that brought starvation to his heart. While she was ever attentive to his wants, her smile lacked the tenderness he had known in the days of danger, and her face was strangely sombre and white.
"Jane," he said to her one day as he came in from his walk and laid down his crutches, "this can't go on any longer. What is the matter? Don't you love me--not at all?"
She stood straight and serious before him, white to the lips, her heart as cold as ice.
"I love you, Graydon, with all my soul. I shall always love you. Please, please, don't ask any more of me. You understand, don't you? We cannot be as we once were--never. That is ended. But, you--you must know that I love you."
"It is sheer madness, dearest, to take that attitude. What else in the world matters so long as we love one another? I felt at first that I could not ask you to be my wife after what my father did that night. That was as silly of me as this is of you. I did not contend long against my love. You have never been out of my mind, night or day. I was tempted more than once to desert-but that was impossible, you know. It was the terrible eagerness to go back to you and compel you to be mine. My father did you a grave wrong. He---"