The suddenness of his departure I learned that afternoon from Mrs.Boyce, who sent me by hand a miserable letter characteristically rambling.
From it I gathered certain facts.

Leonard had come into her bedroom at seven o'clock, awakening her from the first half-hour's sleep she had enjoyed all night, with the news that he had been unexpectedly summoned back.

When she came to think of it, she couldn't imagine how he got the news, for the post did not arrive till eight o'clock, and Mary said no telegram had been delivered and there had been no call on the telephone.

But she supposed the War Office had secret ways of communicating with officers which it would not be well to make known.
The whole of this war, with its killing off of the sons of the best families in the land, and the sleeping in the mud with one's boots on, to say nothing of not being able to change for dinner, and the way in which they knew when to shoot and when not to shoot, was all so mysterious that she had long ago given up hope of understanding any of its details.

All she could do was to pray God that her dear boy should be spared.