The girl made a little involuntary movement. She averted her gaze to the window through which the wintry sunlight was pouring.
"Oh, don't you understand? Can't you? Is the victory so much to you that you have no thought, no feeling, for the suffering it has brought? Are you so hard set on your purpose of achievement that nothing else matters? Oh, it's all dreadful. I used to feel that way. I counted no cost. Achievement? It was everything to me. And now, now that I know the thing it means I feel I—I want to die."
Bull took a strong hold upon himself.
"I know," he said slowly. "You see, Nancy, you're just a woman. You're just as tender and gentle—and—womanly, as God made you to be. He gave you a beautiful woman's heart, and a courage that was quite wonderful till it came into conflict with your heart. You had no right to be flung into this thing. And only a man of Peterman's lack of scruple could have done such a thing. Well, I'm not going to preach a long sermon, but I want to tell you some of the things I've got in my mind before I get the sleep I need. God knows that none of this thing you're blaming yourself for lies at your door. It would all have happened without you. Peterman designed it, and put it through for all he was worth. Now I want to say I'm glad—glad of it all. I've no pity for the Bolshevic dregs of Europe he employed. They were out for loot, they were out to grab the things and the power that other folks set up. Any old death that hit them they amply deserved. As for our folk who've gone under—well, we mustn't think too deeply that way. We all took our chances, and some had to go. I was ready to go. So was Bat. So were we all. We wanted victory, and we wanted it for those who survived. We honour our dead, but our lives must not be clouded by their going. It's war—human war. And just as long as the world lasts that war will always be. Good and bad men will die, and good and bad women will suffer at the sight. But for God's sake have done with the notion that you—you have anything to take to yourself, except that you've fought a good fight, and—lost. It sounds like the devil talking, doesn't it? Maybe you'll think me a monster of heartlessness. I'm not."
"Oh, I wish I could feel all that," Nancy exclaimed with an impulse which a few moments before must have been impossible.
"You can." Bull nodded. "You will."
"You think so?" Nancy sighed. "I wish I could." Suddenly she spread out her hands in a little pathetic gesture. "Oh, it all seems wrong. Everything. What am I to do? What can I do? I—I can't even think. Whichever way I look it all seems so black and hopeless. You think I can—will?"
Bull's sympathy would no longer be denied. He rose from his chair and moved to the window. His face was hidden from the troubled eyes that watched him. But his voice came back infinite in its gentleness.
"You want to do something," he said. "You want to give expression to the woman in you. And when that has happened it'll make you feel—better. I know."
He nodded. Suddenly he turned back to her, and stood smiling down into her anxious eyes.