"Play 'Keep the Home Fires Burning.' It's the most appropriate thing to-night. And Betty, sing it—sing it—to me——"
"If I can," she murmured. "You know what happened when I tried to sing it before—and it's apt to be harder to-night."
"Try, anyway," he urged; and so she began, in the sweetest voice in the world, or so Allen thought, to sing one of the most beautiful songs ever composed.
And how she sang it! Before she had half finished it, the girls were feeling for their handkerchiefs and the boys were staring hard into the fire.
She sang it again—more softly than before, and when the last sweet note had died away, there was not a dry eye in the room.
"Betty, oh, Betty!" cried Allen, leaning across the piano toward her, thrilling her with the new earnestness in his voice, "will you keep the home fires burning for me—so that when I come back—Betty, when I come back——"
She nodded, not trusting herself to speak, and held out a trembling hand to him.
"There will always be one—waiting for you," she whispered softly.
"Hello, folks!"
They turned suddenly and found Will standing in the doorway. Then, such a welcome as they gave him! It made up to him for all these months when he had seemed to stand on the outside, looking in.