Page:Rilla of Ingleside (1921).djvu/94



IÉGE and Namur—and now Brussels!” The doctor shook his head. “I don’t like it—I don’t like it.”

“Do not you lose heart, Dr. dear; they were just defended by foreigners,” said Susan superbly. “Wait you till the Germans come against the British; there will be a very different story to tell and that you may tie to.”

The doctor shook his head again, but a little less gravely; perhaps they all shared subconsciously in Susan’s belief that “the thin grey line” was unbreakable, even by the victorious rush of Germany’s ready millions. At any rate, when the terrible day came—the first of many terrible days—with the news that the British army was driven back they stared at each other in blank dismay.

“It—it can’t be true,” gasped Nan, taking a brief refuge in temporary incredulity.

“I felt that there was to be bad news today,” said Susan, “for that cat-creature turned into Mr. Hyde this morning without rhyme or reason for it, and that was no good omen.”

“‘A broken, a beaten, but not a demoralized, army’,” muttered the doctor, from a London dispatch. “Can it be England’s army of which such a thing is said?”

“It will be a long time now before the war is ended,” said Mrs. Blythe despairingly.