ioned in his phraseology -- "the Russians are like a
steam roller"; she always remembered that she had
heard that phrase from him first. "We have reason
to believe that they can put ten million men into their
fighting line every year for fifty years!"

Rose, in answer, said the first silly thing she had
said that day: "Oh, I do _hope_ the war won't last
as long as that!"

And then she had heard, uttered in a strange voice,
the words, "Another three minutes, sir?" and the
hasty answer at the other end, "No, certainly not!
I've quite done." And she had hung up the receiver
with a smile.

And yet Rose, if well aware of his little foibles,
liked her cousin well enough to be generally glad of
his company. During the last three months he had
spent almost every week-end at Witanbury. And
though it was true, as her mother often observed, that
James was both narrow-minded and self-opinionated,
yet even so he brought with him a breath of larger
air, and he often told the ladies at the Trellis House
interesting things.

While Rose Otway sat musing over her beautiful
work in the garden, good old Anna came and went
in her kitchen. She too still felt restless and anxious,
she too wondered how long this unexpected war would
last. But whereas Rose couldn't have told why she
was restless and anxious, her one-time nurse knew
quite well what ailed herself this afternoon.

Anna had a very good reason for feeling worried
and depressed, but it was one she preferred to keep
to herself. For the last two days she had been ex-

[[52]]

p051 _ -chap- _ toc-1 _ p052w _ toc-2 _ +chap+ _ p053

v?