But when long days and longer nights dragged themselves by and no word at all came from overseas, the girl found out what a big empty place the world may become, even while it is chuck-full of people, and what three thousand miles of water really means. She thought she had known before, but she hadn't. So long as letters traveled back and forth, irregularly timed it might be, but continuously, she still kept the familiar sense of Father--out of sight, but there, as he had always been, most dependably _there_. Now, for the first time in her life, she had called to him and he had not answered. There might be--there probably were, she reminded herself--reasons why he hadn't answered; good, reassuring reasons, if one only knew them. He might be temporarily in a region out of touch with cables; the service might have dropped a link somewhere. One could imagine possible explanations. But it was easier to imagine other things. And the fact remained that, since he didn't answer, she couldn't get away from a horrible, paralyzing sense that he wasn't there. It didn't do any good to try to run from that sensation; there was nowhere to run. It blocked every avenue of thought, a sinister shape of dread. The only help was in keeping very, very busy. And even then one couldn't stop one's thoughts traveling, traveling, traveling along those fearful paths. At last Elliott knew how the others felt about Pete. She had thought she understood that and felt it, too, but now she found that she hadn't. It makes all the difference in the world, she discovered, whether one stands inside or outside a trouble. The heart that had ached so sympathetically for Bruce knew its first stab of loss and recoiled. The others recognized the difference; or was it only that Elliott herself had eyes to see what she had been blind to before? No one said anything. In little unconscious, lovable ways they made it quite clear that now she was one with them. "Perhaps we would better send for them to come home from Camp Devens," Father Bob suggested one day. He threw out his remark at the supper-table, which would seem to address it to the family at large, but he looked straight at Elliott. "Oh, no," she cried, "don't _send_ for them!" But she couldn't keep a flash of joy out of her eyes. "Sure you're not getting tired?" "Certain sure!" It disappointed her the least little bit that Uncle Bob let the suggestion drop so readily. And she was disappointed at her own disappointment. "Can't you 'carry on' _at all_?" she demanded of herself, scornfully. "It was all your own doing, you know." But how she did long at times for Aunt Jessica!