But to the girls, subdued in spirit somewhat by the pertinacious intrusion of the future possibilities which took advantage of this long-drawn farewell, the rough-and-ready banquet had in it something of the solemn and portentous,--something indeed of a sacrament, though the apparently jovial ones down below did not seem to regard it so. It was a farewell feast. It was hardly possible that all those stalwart diners would return. And as their eyes wandered over them, returning oftenest to their own two, they wondered who would be taken,--who left to return to them. “I couldn’t eat to save my life,” said Vic. “Nor I. And I don’t believe they’re eating much either. They’re just pretending to.” When the feasting was over the place became a maelstrom again, with much hearty wringing of hands, and good lucks, and good wishes, and parting gifts of plethoric boxes of matches and cigars and cigarettes. And then they were all formed up into two long lines again, and the girls sped down the narrow stone staircases to be near them at the last. They were just in time to march alongside their own two as far as the Central Hall, but it was only when the hodden-gray mass was slowly making its way down the dark stairway that they had the chance to speak. “We’ve got to sleep in this hole to-night, they say,” said Noel. “Rotten!” “When do you think you’ll go?” asked Honor. “Dear knows. We never know anything till we’re doing it.” “We shall come up in the morning to see if you’re still here.” “That’ll be nice. But don’t bother!” “We may be here for days,” said Gregor. “We’ve got used to hanging on and waiting orders. It’s the weariest part of the work.” “Well, we’ll keep on coming up till you go. We’d like to see the last of them, wouldn’t we, Vic?--I mean,” with a quick little catch of the breath that nearly choked her, “the last till you come back.” “Rather! You see, we wouldn’t be sure you really had gone unless we saw it with our own eyes.” “Think we’d bolt?--Or want to get rid of us?” grinned Noel. “Oh--neither. Just to know, you know.” And then the boys had to go below, and the girls went away home, and hardly spoke a word all the way. They went up again next day and found the draft still standing-by in huge disgust at the delay. And again the next day--and the next,--and the next; and each time found the boys growling louder and deeper. “Got us out of Head-Quarters and forgotten us, the bally idiots!” was Noel’s opinion. “You might just trot round and ask ’em what they jolly well mean by it. Tell ’em we’re not going to put up with it much longer.” “All going to desert for a change,” said Gregor. “It’s a sight harder work than fighting.” Then one morning when the girls arrived at the Hall it was lonely and deserted. The draft had gone. “Just as well, maybe,” said Honor philosophically, when she had got her face quite straight again. “I believe I should have cried at the last, and I hate crying in public.”