They grew skilled in the art of talking the men’s minds away from their sufferings; and Sheila—‘Mouse’ though she was—showed so notable a gift for this form of spiritual healing, that Lady Forsyth finally christened her ‘Queen of the Poor Things.’ Some mother-quality in her touch and tone seemed to go straight to their hearts. Men who left the station groaning and clenching their teeth, to keep the curses back, would surprisingly soon be conjured into recounting their adventures, or, better still, talking of wives and children at home. Keith himself confessed that he had never properly appreciated the British Tommy till he carried him wounded, and Helen lost her heart a dozen times over. More than once, when they chanced upon men shattered and bandaged past human recognition, she came very near losing her head; but only once did she disgrace herself by fainting outright. On that occasion Keith carried her straight back to their hotel, laid her on the sofa and stayed by her till she was sufficiently recovered to feel very much ashamed of herself. ‘Promise I won’t do it again,’ she assured him, as he stood leaning over her. ‘No, that you _certainly_ won’t,’ he said sternly. ‘If ever you do, I shall pack you straight off home. To-night, for a punishment, you’ll go early to bed. Sheila will be quite safe with me.’ Argument and rebellion were useless. Moreover, she was honestly exhausted, and before ten o’clock she was sound asleep. But even weariness could not break the habit of short rest, and by one of the morning she was amazingly wide awake. Some distant sound had roused her, and now it drew nearer—footsteps and voices; men cheering and singing of ‘la gloire’ and ‘la mort.’ Nearer still they came, tramping along the pavement, till they were almost under her open window. Then she was aware of a discordant note in that gallant chorus. One voice, raised in terror and remonstrance, was trying to dominate those other voices that were obviously shouting it down. ‘J’ai peur! Mon Dieu, camarades, j’ai peur!’ The words reached her distinctly now. But the rest, unheeding, sang louder than ever of ‘la mort’ and ‘la gloire.’ Possibly they were sorry for him. The coward is the unhappiest of men. Yet he too, being ‘enfant de la patrie,’ must go, even as others went; and Helen Forsyth, hearing him go, found the tears streaming down her face—not for the coercion of one reluctant citizen, but for the unending horror and misery of it all: the fear and the anguish and the calculated cruelty that were so infinitely worse than death. Sheila, sleeping the profound sleep of healthily exhausted youth, stirred not an eyelash even when the noise was at its height. But for Helen that pitiful interlude had put an end to rest and had opened the door to nightmare memories and her own most private fears.