Pen shook her head. "Jimmy, about twice more like this and I'd be actually thinking seriously of leaving Sara and marrying you. God help me to keep from ever doing as yellow a thing as that, Still. But, somehow tonight, I thought that just this once would help us both through all the hard months to come. And the memory will be mighty sweet. We--we need a memory to take some of the bitterness out of it all, Still. If I'm wrong in doing this, why the blame is mine alone." Jim lay silently, holding her hands closer and closer, looking into her face with eyes that did not waver. Pen smiled and disengaged one hand to smooth his hair again. "I'm a poor preacher. My life is just an endless struggle not to let my mistakes wreck other people as well as myself. Jim, the thing that will be bigger than all we've missed is to make you give the world all the fine force that is in you. We've _got_ to save the dam for you and for the country. I shall be with you every moment, Jim, no matter where either of us is, bracing you with all the will I've got. Never forget that!" Little by little the steel lines crept over Jim's face again. "I shall not forget, little Pen. How sweet you are! How good! How less than a lump of dough I'd be if I didn't put up a good fight after this!--dearest!" In the silence that followed, they did not take their gaze from each other. Then Pen started, as Mrs. Flynn came in at the front door and stopped with her mouth open. But Jim would not free Pen's hand. "Mother Flynn must have guessed," he said slowly, "and--she knows us both!" Mrs. Flynn came over to the couch eagerly. "I do that!" she exclaimed, "and my heart is wore to a string, God knows, sorrowing for the two of you." "I came in to see you and found Jim asleep and--he's got so much trouble ahead of him, I couldn't help trying to comfort him just this once. I'll never do it again," said Pen, like a child. Mrs. Flynn threw her apron over her head, then pulled it down again to say, "God knows I'm a good Catholic, but I'm glad you did it. Don't I know what a touch of the hand means to remember? Is there a day of my life I don't live over every caress Timothy Flynn ever gave me? Would I sit in judgment on two as fine as I know the both of you are? I'm going to make us a cup of tea for our nerves." Jim swung his long legs off the couch and lifted Pen to her feet. "The two of you have tea," he said. "I've had a better tonic. I'm going out for a look at the night shift." By the time that Mrs. Flynn had bustled about and produced the tea, Pen had regained her composure and was ready to tell Mrs. Flynn of the errand that had brought her to the house, which was that when Jane Ames came up on the morrow the three were to have a council of war on how to help Jim. Wild horse could not have dragged from her what Suma-theek had told her, since Jim so evidently wanted it kept a secret. Nevertheless, all that a woman could do, possessing that knowledge, Pen was going to do.