A little of that new vision which had been vouchsafed to him, Peter confided to Patricia, haltingly and half ashamed of it, during their last night together; and after he had fallen asleep she lay for a long time, listening to his easy breathing, hoping and fearing for him, wondering about him.

Her own patriotism was a simple star-clear faith in birth and flag; his, she had never yet entirely understood. It seemed to her a voiceless sullen creed—superstition rather than belief. Striving to analyse it, a fantasy came to her. It was as though she stood among the ruins of a huge temple in the midst of a desolate city. Outside, guns flashed and boomed: their flashes illumined the black sky above the roofless temple. Round her, on the brick-strewn floor, among the fragments of granite pillars and stained-glass windows, knelt men—thousands upon thousands of armed and helmeted men. Their helmets were dinted, their arms foul and bloody, their drab uniforms wet and clotted with yellow slime. And from a ruined altar, One spoke to the men on their knees, saying:

“Know ye the Whys and the Wherefores of this thing ye do?”

Then the kneeling men answered as with one voice:

“Neither the Whys nor the Wherefores of this Thing are known to us; nor do we care to know them. Only we know that this Thing we do is the Fine Thing: and with that knowledge we are content.”

Then said the One at the altar: “This is My Work which ye accomplish.”

But the men on their knees answered him: “What is that to us? We have set our hands to this Work and, Thine or another’s, we will accomplish it. For this Work is the Fine Thing.”

And so saying they rose from their knees, man after helmÈd man; rose and passed out into the desolation of the city....

But fantasy proved no consolation to Patricia when, once again, she bade her man good-bye!