"That's very possible. But will the people at home? I'm jangled, Margaret, I know it--just for the time. . . . However, don't let's talk about me. Tell me about yourself. . . ." The girl shrugged her shoulders slightly. "I don't know that there's much to tell. I've never been so happy in my life as I am at present . . ." "In spite of all that?" He pointed out of the window to two soldiers limping painfully by on sticks. "Yes--in spite of all that. One gets accustomed to that--and one's doing something. After all, Derek, you get accustomed to death and mutilation up there in front. It doesn't affect you. . . ." "No, not to the same extent as it did. In a way, I suppose not at all. But you--you were so different." He thoughtfully drained his tea cup, and set it down again, and for a space neither of them spoke. "I can't help laughing at the comparison," said Margaret suddenly. "Five years ago you and I were sitting in Rumpolmayer's, surrounded by sugar cakes, being smart." "They're doing that now in London except for the sugar cakes." "We shouldn't have been silent for a moment, and we should have enjoyed ourselves thoroughly . . . I wonder--" "It was our only standard, wasn't it?" "And now we can sit over a cup of weak and nasty tea--without milk and not talk for effect. . . . What's going to happen, Derek, to you and me afterwards? We can never go back to it?" "No--you can't put back the clock--and we've grown, Margaret, years and years older. So have thousands of others--the boys up yonder, their people at home. But what about the business train to Brighton, and the occupants thereof? . . . Have they felt this war, except to make a bit more boodle out of it?" "They're only a small minority." "Are they? They're a damned powerful one." He laughed a little bitterly. "And they're artificial--just like we were before the war." "That's why it's we who have got to do the rebuilding. Even if it's only the rebuilding the house in our own little tiny circle, with simplicity and reality as the keystones. . . . You see, if you get enough tiny circles sound and good, in time the others may follow. . . ." "Dear lady, you've become very optimistic." Vane's eyes smiled at her. "Let's hope you're right." He paused and looked at her quietly. "Margaret. I've never asked you before--but you're different now--so different. Incidentally so am I. What was it, that made you alter so suddenly?" Margaret rose to her feet, and shook her head. "I'll tell you some day, Derek, perhaps. Not just now. I must be getting back to the hospital." "Will you come out and have tea with me to-morrow?" For a few moments she looked at him as if undecided, and then suddenly she seemed to make up her mind. "All right," she said with a smile. "I'll come, I want to deal with this jaundice of yours. One must live up to a professional reputation." CHAPTER II