"Nina!—this is a pleasure, you old dear!—now let me look at you and see what marriage has done—."
Nina drew back and laughed!
"Everything, Nicholas!" she said—.
A feeling of envy came over me—Jim's ankle is stiff for life—it seems hard that an eye can make such a difference!—Nina is in love with Jim, but no woman can be in love with me.
Her face is much softer, she is more attractive altogether.
"You look splendid, Nina," I told her—"I want to hear all about it."
"So you shall when we have finished dinner," and she handed me my crutch as I got up from my chair.
Pierre had secured some quite respectable food, and during dinner and afterwards when we were cosily smoking our cigarettes in the sitting-room, Nina gave me all the news of our friends at home.—Every single one of them was still working, she said.
"It is marvelous how they have stuck it," I responded—.
"Oh no, not at all," Nina answered. "We as a nation are people of habit—the war is a habit to us now—heaps of us work from a sense of duty and patriotism, others because they are afraid what would be said of them if they did not—others because they are thankful to have some steady job to get off their superfluous energy on—So it ends by everyone being roped in—and you can't think, Nicholas, how divine it is to get home after long hours of drudgery, to find the person you love waiting for you, and to know you are going to have all the rest of the time together, until next day!"