Ethel’s letters to Barton were strictly business, without being coldly formal. She allowed them to sound a note of cool friendliness in the beginning and at the close but nothing deeper. An expression of hope for his good health was as warm a phrase as entered into them. His polite, brief acknowledgments, addressed to her home, showed that he considered their correspondence nothing more than a business arrangement. She realized that she was by no means the only person in Mailsburg interested in the absent ones in camp and barracks. The town was beginning to wake up to the exigencies of the war. The ministers prayed for the boys on Sunday, and every social and charitable organization in Mailsburg began to talk of work for the soldiers at least, whether or not any of them really did much at first. At this time in her heart Ethel hated the idea of war so desperately that the many activities connected with the draft and the going away and the war itself seemed to her mind both futile and non-beneficial. If those young men really got as far as France, and into the trenches, they would be killed. They were merely “cannon fodder” in that case. And if they did not go--if the war ended, as some people said it would, before many of them got over there--then all this talk and planning was so much wasted breath and time and money. It was a fact that, at this particular time, Ethel Clayton had little interest save in her work and in the affairs of the Hapwood-Diller Company--particularly in Frank Barton’s absence from his post and how it might affect the concern for which they both worked. Just as she felt that there were plenty of other men to go to the war and that Barton might be spared, so she felt that there were already too many women, both foolish and wise, giving their time and thought to war work. The local papers began to be full of news of the various activities of the several organizations in this connection. In addition some of those desirous of notoriety were getting a heap of free advertising. “I declare!” said Mrs. Clayton, busily clicking her knitting needles, “the _Clarion_ toots a loud note almost every day for that girl of Mehitable Fuller’s. She’s first into one thing and then another--like a spoiled kitten. And all this folderol about the war seems to give her more of a chance than ever to show off.” “I wonder,” said Ethel, thoughtfully, “if we ought not to think more about it than we do, Mother? I sit here with my hands idle in the evening. I wonder if all this knitting I see going on hasn’t a basis of honest endeavor in it, after all?” “Pshaw!” said her mother. “I know it looks silly. Looks like a fad. One of the girls in the office brings her knitting bag. She’s at the switchboard and has more or less idle time. Instead of reading silly love stories as she used, she knits.” “What does she knit?”