"Goodness! This is no way for a gentleman to behave," she said to herself oddly; and must have spoken aloud, for the voice of Ellen Neal responded. "There, there, my lamb! Yell all you want. You ain't no gentleman, thank goodness! but just a poor little girl who's got a right to holler all she likes. That's _one_ right the men-folks ain't going to deny us and get away with it--not them!" Ellen as she spoke glared truculently at the doctor. It was not the first accouchement at which she had assisted, and at such moments she became feministic almost to the point of violence. Even Archie found it safer to remain out of reach of her accusing eye. But long, very long afterwards, Ellen herself admitted him once more to the Presence, for the sake of the burden he carried--a subdued, queerly gentle Ellen, with all the acerbity gone from voice and manner, and in its place something rather beautiful. It was motherhood that glowed in her, had any one cared to notice; motherhood come by vicariously, as Ellen Neal came by all the loveliness in life. "See, my lamb," she murmured, bending over the bed. "Open them pretty eyes and look who's here! Come close, Mr. Archie, and show her the present you've brought her. Quiet, now!--she ain't up to much. It's a surprise, Joie. Open your eyes and look!" It was a surprise, indeed. Joan, by great effort, managed to focus her gaze on Archie's burden. She shut her eyes quickly, and opened them again. They were still there; not one, but two little wrinkled, fuzzy heads. "Can you beat it?" demanded Archie, shakily, "Some little present, eh?" He held them out to her. Joan's lips moved, twitching. "From a Friend," was what she said; and Archie, recognizing a jest on sight, let out such a roar of joy that the twins awoke with pin-prick wails, and a nurse came running, and he was thrust once more into outer darkness. There a message was brought to him. "Your wife says why don't you telegraph President Roosevelt about it?" And literal Archie did so.... But this was the last laughter heard in the house of Blair for many a weary week. Twins require more strength for their bearing and rearing than Joan, taken so unawares, was able to provide. The Major's final act of gallantry cost a good deal in the way of human life, which may, or may not, have been of more value than the life he saved. Afterwards, when she was able to think again, Joan sometimes wondered whether his death was not perhaps an even more futile thing than his life had been; yet she would not have had it otherwise. His widow had caused to be erected to his memory the finest granite monolith obtainable for money, bearing the inscription, "Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends"; and Joan, after her first startled distaste for the grandiloquence passed, was able to appreciate how deeply the memorial must gratify the proud spirit of a Darcy, if it lingered near enough to know. CHAPTER XLIII