"Why not? This has always been the place of happiness?" She caught her breath, then went on quickly, "You mustn't think that I am heartless. But if the women who have lost should let themselves despair, it would react on the living. The wailing of women means the weakness of men. I believe that so firmly that I am afraid to—cry."
"You are braver than I—" slowly.
"No. You'd feel the same way, dear child, about Derry."
"No. I should not. I shouldn't feel that way at all. I should die—if I lost Derry—"
Light leaped in her lover's eyes. But he shook his head. "She'd bear it like other brave women. She doesn't know herself, Margaret."
"None of us do. Do you suppose that the wives and mothers of France ever dreamed that it would be their fortitude which would hold the enemy back?"
"Do you think it did, really?" Jean asked her.
"I know it. It has been a barrier as tangible as a wall of rock."
"You put an awful responsibility upon the women."
"Why not? They are the mothers of men."