Horrible prospect! Jack's military ardour cooled visibly. "Anyhow, it would be their fault."
"And I should chase after you and beg of you to marry me, all the same,—limbless and unrecognisable as you may be!"
"You would? You said just now you would have to obey."
"Of course I would obey, but only for a time. Do you think I shall ever give you up, even if the skies were to fall?"
That finished it. Jack was in heaven again, and the time passed with amazing rapidity.
Meanwhile, Joyce had been to see Baby Douglas asleep in his crib and was weighing the pros and cons of her problem with agonised uncertainty. He was now as healthy as any normal infant of his age, and was in the care of an experienced and trustworthy nurse. At Wynthrop Manor he would be in the lap of luxury, wanting for nothing, and his grandparents would be sure to bring him up in the way he should go, till she and Ray came home together on his next furlough ... (after the War!—whenever that might be!). But all her baby's pretty ways and unfolding intelligence would be for others to enjoy! She, his devoted mother, would be thousands of miles away!
The thought brought forth a flood of tears, and expressions of sympathy from the nurse. "If it makes you feel so badly, I wouldn't go if I were you."
"It breaks my heart!"
"There now, don't take on so. Give up the idea. You will feel easier in mind to leave him when he is a bit older."
"It will be just as bad—perhaps worse!" cried Joyce, thinking of the possibility of a loveless reunion with Ray, if she stayed away too long! In that case she would have no compensation for her act of self-sacrifice.