Page:Rilla of Ingleside (1921).djvu/172

 Blythe—this tortured thing who had been quite happy a few minutes ago? Outside, a quartette was singing “We'll never let the old flag fall”—the music seemed to be coming from some remote distance. Why couldn’t she cry, as she had cried when Jem told them he must go? If she could cry perhaps this horrible something that seemed to have seized on her very life might let go. But no tears came! Where was her scarf and coat? She must get away and hide herself like an animal hurt to the death.

Was it a coward’s part to run away like this? The question came to her suddenly as if some one else had asked it. She thought of the shambles of the Flanders front—she thought of her brother and her playmate helping to hold those fire-swept trenches. What would they think of her if she shirked her little duty here—the humble duty of carrying the program through for her Red Cross? But she couldn’t stay—she couldn’t—yet what was it mother had said when Jem went—“when our women fail in courage our men be fearless still?” But this—this was unbearable.

Still, she stopped half way to the door and went back to the window. Irene was singing now; her beautiful voice—the only real thing about her—soared clear and sweet through the building. Rilla knew that the girls’ Fairy Drill came next. Could she go out there and play for it? Her head was aching now—her throat was burning. Oh, why had Irene told her just then, when telling could do no good? Irene had been very cruel. Rilla remembered now that more than once that day she had caught her mother looking at her with an odd expression. She had been too busy to wonder what it meant. She understood now.