Michael, the best dressed man of his day, was bereft of speech.
“You’re a little confused still,” said Serena. “You were wounded in the head at Ypres. You have been ill a long time.”
There was a silence.
“I remember,” said John Damer at last. “Have they taken the Ridge?”
“Yes, long ago.”
“Long ago? Oh! can it be—is it possible? Have we?”—the old man reared himself suddenly in bed, and raised two thin gnarled arms. “Have we—won the war?”
“Yes,” said Michael, as Serena put her arms round his father, and laid him back on his pillow. “We have won the war.”
John Damer lay back panting, trembling from head to foot.
“Thank God,” he said, and in his sunken lashless eyes two tears gathered, and ran down the grey furrows of his cheeks, and lost themselves in his long white beard.
They gave him the sedative which the doctor had left ready for him, and when he had sunk back into unconsciousness, they stole out of the room.