That was what lay like a shadow over the brightness brought by the recognition of her. The war was to be finished by that hoarded effort for which those who knew were breathlessly waiting. But the hoard was chiefly of men, and much of it must be scattered if success was to be gained by it. Lady Brent made no pretence of taking it anything but seriously. "I have friends at the War Office," she said. "We should get news at Royd as soon as in London, perhaps sooner." She made no allusion to the other reason that Viola had given. How did Harry regard Bastian? She had talked that over with Wilbraham. They did not know even if he had met him. He was not to be asked to Royd until Harry gave the word. Viola still seemed to be hesitating, and Lady Brent took her hesitation to mean that she would rather not come to Royd without Harry, and accepted it at once. She talked to her about Harry, and presently Viola was talking about him too, filling her hungry ears with news of the times at which she had missed him. Viola knew that he had been wounded, though he had kept it from her at the time. "He was very ill after the second wound," she said. "A man who was with him wrote to me when he couldn’t, and I got a telegram to say he was better before I got the letter, so I wasn’t so unhappy as I might have been. I don’t think he would have got through that if he hadn’t been so splendidly strong and young, and hadn’t been so devotedly nursed. All the men he was with loved him, and this one never left him." Lady Brent would not let it be seen how much this news of his past danger moved her. Here was a thing for which none of her searching thoughts had prepared her. "He has told us scarcely anything of what has been happening to him," she said. "It seemed to lie upon him heavily." "It doesn’t now," said Viola. "Being at Royd has brought him back. He has told me all about Jane and Sidney. Do you think I might write to Jane now, and tell her about us?" Lady Brent was struck by her entire absence of jealousy. She might have felt sad that the healing process had not been all her own work. It showed how unselfishly she loved him, and how sure she was of him. "Jane is a loyal little soul," she said. "She will be very pleased to hear from you, I know." She smiled at Viola. "The one thing I never quite gauged at its proper value was the companionship of young people. I think now that he ought to have had more of it. But he seemed so happy, with all his own pursuits." "Oh, he was happy, I know," she said, eagerly. "It is wonderful to hear him talk of his life at Royd. Perhaps I’m not altogether sorry I was nearly the first, because I got it all. Harry isn’t like anybody else that ever lived. He’s wonderful. He couldn’t have been quite the same if he hadn’t been brought up always in that beautiful place, and left a great deal to himself and the woods and the hills and the sea."