quickly, while her brows met in an uncertain frown, as though her ill-health were a tiresome burden which she would gladly be rid of, but to which she had grown so accustomed that it now seemed impossible to throw it aside.

"I know a little exercise would make you hungrier," Mrs. Gordon went on, "and while riding would be too violent on our army horses, even if the airplanes didn't frighten them too much to make it safe, I think a little tennis wouldn't hurt. Oh, Marian, how beautifully you've done that!"

Lucy had held out for her mother's inspection a smooth, almost perfect little square which Marian had just added to the pile. Mrs. Gordon, always more willing to praise than to find fault, was delighted at her success in the delicate art of making neat compresses, and said so, enthusiastically.

Marian smiled with pleasure, and bent over her work again, her bright hair falling about her shoulders and her thin, little fingers busy, while Lucy, glancing up, thought to herself as she patted and poked, "She is pretty, and if I could just shake her and wake her up, and get her acting like a regular girl, I'd like her."

P 28

P 28

"Lucy," said Mrs. Gordon, looking at her daughter's completed pile, "I want you to walk over to Headquarters now, and bring back a letter Father wants to show me."

"All right, Mother. Will you come, Marian?" asked Lucy, getting up with a jump from her prolonged quiet.

"No, I guess not," Marian answered, hesitating for a second over her refusal, but deciding in favor of what required least effort.

"I'll take William," said Lucy, going out on the grass, where the little boy was sitting cross-legged, carefully shelling peanuts for an impatient squirrel who would much rather have done it for himself.

"O-oh, Lucy, isn't he a pig!" asked William, catching sight of his sister as he began ruefully sucking his thumb where the greedy squirrel had nipped it, and ungratefully darted off over his shoulder with a flirt of his big tail in William's face.

"You ought to let him have it whole. He can shell harder things than we can. Come on, hurry," said Lucy, holding out her hand. "We're going over to Father's office a minute."

They cut across the grass, and in five minutes reached the long, yellow brick building 

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