"I am not so sure," she said. "I think it must be pretty easy to be brave when you are marching with hundreds of other people, while drums are beating and flags waving, and you remember that England expects you to do your duty, and that the whole world will talk of it to-morrow if you do well. It would be quite easy for you, Mildred; for you are never afraid, and you would get so excited that you would hardly know what you were doing. It will be much harder for you to sit still here and be cheerful; and to do the hardest thing must be heroic! I will write to you often, Mildred; all the girls will write. You will have heaps of letters." "That will be nice. I love letters," said Mildred gratefully. She cheered up a little at the prospect, and talked to her friend for the next half-hour without relapsing into tears. Nevertheless, the remembrance of the poor, disfigured face weighed heavily on Bertha's heart, and she could talk of nothing else, as she and Lois finished their packing later on the same evening. "I feel quite mean to be going home when poor Mildred is left here alone," she said. "And we have such a happy time. Father and Mother are so good, they give us almost everything we ask in the holidays. I wonder--" She stopped short as if struck with a brilliant idea, and stared into her sister's eyes. "I wonder--" echoed Lois immediately, and her voice had the same ring, her face the same curious expression. The pupils at Milvern House were often amazed at the instinctive manner in which these two sisters leapt to an understanding of each other's meaning, and the present instance it was evident that Lois needed no explanation of that mysterious "I wonder." "We are twins, you know," they were accustomed to say, when questioned about this peculiarity, and it seemed as if this fact did indeed save them from much conversational exercise. "We will see!" said Bertha again, and Lois nodded her head and repeated, "We will see!" while her face lit up with smiles. But Mildred did not know what pleasant schemes her friends were plotting on her behalf, and she lay, face downwards, crying heart-brokenly upon her bed. CHAPTER FOUR. BAD NEWS FROM HOME. The next morning Mildred awoke with a wail of despairing remembrance. She hid her face in the pillow and wondered how she was to live through the day, to see the different batches of girls leave the house at ten o'clock, at eleven, at one, at half a dozen different times, while she was left alone in solitary misery.