Bitter loss, the loss of disappointment which at the time the soul tells one is worse than loss by death, he had known over Blanche; pain, anger, hardness, with his family he could not have missed; horror and remorse had both assailed him over Phoebe; natural sorrow that held no sense of outrage he had felt for the loss of Killigrew and Boase. But this was something different--this aching sense of helplessness, of a passion of protectiveness that could avail neither Vassie under his roof nor Nicky on the far veldt. He had not been of those who are insensitive to the pain of the world--rather had it held too much of his sympathies; but now, in the sublime selfishness of great personal grief, he felt he would give everything--the war, the whole rest of the world--to have Nicky back in safety. That was only at first, or when the fear was strongest; at other times his sense of proportion and knowledge of how Nicky himself would feel towards such a sentiment, brought him to a truer poise. The war dragged on. The nation began to see that it was not to be the "walk-over" so confidently expected; disasters occurred, long sieges wore the folk at home even as those in the beleaguered towns, growls against the Government were raised, people talked of "muddling through," and every barrel-organ in the land ground out "Soldiers of the Queen" and "The Absent-minded Beggar." Then the world went mad and mafficked, felt a little ashamed of itself, and became, for the first time for years, rather usefully introspective and self-critical. And "Nicky ... Nicky ... Nicky ..." beat out every swing of the pendulum of Time at Cloom.