Page:Rilla of Ingleside (1921).djvu/328

 through the future of our land. Everything about me is calm and peaceful and ‘homey.’ Walter seems very near me—if I could just sweep aside the thin wavering little veil that hangs between, I could see him—just as he saw the Pied Piper the night before Courcelette.

“Over there in France tonight—does the line hold?”

 

N March of the year of grace 1918 there was one week into which must have crowded more of searing human agony than any seven days had ever held before in the history of the world. And in that week there was one day when all humanity seemed nailed to the cross; on that day the whole planet must have been agroan with universal convulsion; everywhere the hearts of men were failing them for fear.

It dawned calmly and coldly and grayly at Ingleside. Mrs. Blythe and Rilla and Miss Oliver made ready for church in a suspense tempered by hope and confidence. The doctor was away, having been summoned during the wee sma’s to the Marwood household in the Upper Glen, where a little war-bride was fighting gallantly on her own battle-ground to give life, not death, to the world. Susan announced that she meant to stay home that morning—a rare decision for Susan. 