His nurse looked down upon him with quickened interest. "Are you a father?" she asked. "Yes. Only just, though! I—I—haven’t seen It yet!" His voice quivered suddenly, to think how near he had gone to not seeing It at all. "I am glad you came through," said Little Lily quietly; and handed him _The Times_ to read with his breakfast. Roy poured out his tea, stretched back luxuriously, and unfolded the paper. Like most of us in those days, he turned first to the casualty list. The names of the officers alone filled two columns. "I wonder if my old cracked cranium has figured here yet," he ruminated. "What a nice little thrill if it’s in to-day!" He glanced down the long list of wounded. "No, nothing doing! It has probably been in already." He turned in more leisurely fashion to the previous column, and began to read the names of the killed. But his eye got no further than the first name. There were no A’s to-day: this began with B. He laid the paper down, and grinned to himself. "I’d rather read it than be it!" he reflected. Then, suddenly, a blinding thought smote him. Marjorie! What if she had seen it? He sat up excitedly, as a further probability occurred to him. "She must have been notified privately by the War Office long ago. Then, of all times!" He was talking to himself now, in a low, agitated voice. "My God! I wonder where she is! The old man never told me when he wired; but he’ll know." His voice rose. "Nurse! Nurse! Nurse!" "Great Scott!" announced Mr. Abercrombie from the opposite room: "The lad has succumbed already! And I _warned_ him!" But already Lady Hermione’s tall figure was framed in Roy’s doorway. "Here I am," she said. "Don’t shout, please. You will find a bell-push under your pillow, if you look.... Why, my _dear_, what is it?" Roy handed her the paper, pointing dumbly. "My wife!" he whispered. "She’ll think I’m— And I don’t even know where she is—to contradict it! Have you a telephone here? Could you ring up Lord Eskerley’s house in London? He’ll know! He knows everything! He knows—" Lady Hermione laid a cool hand upon his bandaged forehead. "Don’t get flustered!" she said. "Get up, and put on your dressing-gown. I will show you where the telephone is." Next moment, with Roy swaying on her arm, she was sailing down the passage in the direction of the office in the front hall. "They’re keeping company already! Quick work! Quick work!" commented Master Abercrombie, admiringly. *CHAPTER XXII* *THE MILLS OF GOD* "He must have left a will of some kind," said Lord Eskerley. "He made one before he went to France," I replied; "but that has been invalidated by his marriage. It doesn’t really matter; because everything—the baronetcy, Baronrigg, and so on—will pass automatically to the child."