"Are you sure it boiled?" she said sceptically, as she sank into her chair, her eyes dancing. "No man knows when a kettle boils."
"Try it! For five winters on the Saguenay, I made my own tea—and baked my own bread. Men are better cooks than women when they give their minds to it!" He brought her the cup, hot and fragrant, and she sipped it in pure content while he stood smiling above her, leaning against the mantelpiece.
"I wanted to see you," he said presently. "I've just got my marching orders. Let's see. This is October. I shall have just a month. They've found another man to take over this job, but he can't come till November."
"And—peace?" said Rachel, looking up.
For Prince Max of Baden had just made his famous peace offer of October 5th, and even in rural Brookshire there was a thrilling sense of opening skies, of some loosening of those iron bonds in which the world had lain for four years.
"There will be no peace!" said Ellesborough with sudden energy, "so long as there is a single German soldier left in Belgium or France!"
She saw him stiffen from head to foot—and thrilled to the flame of avenging will that suddenly possessed him. The male looked out upon her, kindling—by the old, old law—the woman in her.
"And if they don't accept that?"
"Then the war will go on," he said briefly, "and I shall be in for the last lap!"
His colour changed a little. She put down her cup and bent over the fire, warming her hands.