“I shall be present, Helen. I suppose my
mind has been weak like my body; but the time has
come when I must take up life again and accept its
conditions as others are doing. You certainly
are setting me a good example. I admit that my
illness has left a peculiar repugnance to hearing
and thinking about the war; it all seemed so very
horrible. But if our brave men can face the thing
itself, I should be weak indeed if I could not listen
to a eulogy of their deeds.”
“I am coming to think,” resumed Helen,
thoughtfully, “that the battle line extends
from Maine to the Gulf, and that quiet people like
you and me are upon it as truly as the soldiers in
the field. I have thought that perhaps the most
merciful wounds are often those which kill outright.”
“I can easily believe that,” he said.
His quiet tone and manner did not deceive her, and
she looked at him wistfully as she resumed, “But
if they do not kill, the pain must be borne patiently,
even though we are in a measure disabled.”
“Yes, Helen; and you are disabled in your power
to give me what I can never help giving you.
I know that. I will not misjudge or presume upon
your kindness. We are too good friends to affect
any concealments from each other.”
“You have expressed my very thought. When
you spoke of accepting the conditions of life, I hoped
you had in mind what you have said—the
conditions of life as they are, as we cannot help
or change them. We both have got to take up life
under new conditions.”
“You have; not I, Helen.”
Tears rushed to her eyes as she faltered, “I
would be transparently false should I affect not to
know. What I wish you to feel through the coming
months and years is that I cannot—that
I am disabled by my wound.”
“I understand, Helen. We can go on as we
have begun. You have lost, as I have not, for
I have never possessed. You will be the greater
sufferer; and it will be my dear privilege to cheer
and sustain you in such ways as are possible to a
simple friend.”
She regarded him gratefully, and for the first time
since that terrible May morning the semblance of a
smile briefly illumined her face.
MARTINE SEEKS AN ANTIDOTE
It can readily be understood that Martine in his expedition
to the South had not limited his efforts solely to
his search for Captain Nichol. Wherever it had
been within his power he had learned all that he could
of other officers and men who had come from his native
region; and his letters to their relatives had been
in some instances sources of unspeakable comfort.
In his visit to the front he had also seen and conversed
with his fellow-townsmen, some of whom had since perished
or had been wounded. As he grew stronger, Helen
wrote out at his dictation all that he could remember
concerning these interviews; and these accounts became
precious heirlooms in many families.
