Page:Conflict (1927).pdf/157

 'Will it help win the war for you to marry Felix?'

'Oh, only indirectly, I suppose,' she sighed, 'by making the man I sent into it a little bit happier. But it's all I can do. It's the only way I can take part. And I do want to take part so! I don't want to be a slacker, Dr. Sheldon. You see,' she shrugged, 'I'm one of those individuals who didn't enlist early. I wanted to be a nurse—awfully. If I was a nurse in France, it wouldn't be my duty, perhaps, to marry Felix. But it is my duty now. I've been drafted, don't you see? I've been drafted for this job, and I'm not going to run away from it. You can talk till doom's-day.'

'I think your mother might let you be a nurse in France now,' remarked John Sheldon, 'if you'll break off with Felix.'

'Break off with Felix? Now? Why, it would kill him. He's always cared so terribly—so simply terribly. No. It's too late now.'

'But'

'Oh, let's not talk about it.' She stood up. 'It won't do the least good. You must reconcile mother and father to it. Make them realize, somehow, there is a war going on. Other girls' parents understand and codperate. I wish they would. Then I would be happy. I did so want to please them when I married.'

'But you won't actually marry Felix, will you?'