The chaplain, an earnest man, found men and women more willing to listen to him, than in any spot in which he had ever spoken the message entrusted to him.

Perhaps the aviation field had something to do with it; the people in the fort were always near to life and to death.

The chaplain disliked to find himself watching particular faces in the chapel when he preached the simple, soldierly sermons on Sundays, and was annoyed with himself that he always saw, above all others, Anita Fortescue's gaze, and that of Mrs.Lawrence, as she sat far back in the chapel.

Anita's eyes were full of questionings, and dark with sadness; but Mrs.Lawrence, in her plain black gown and hat, sometimes with Lawrence by her side, always with the beautiful boy, sitting among the soldiers and their wives, embodied tragedy.

The chaplain sometimes went to see Mrs.Lawrence; she was a delicate woman, and often ill, and the chaplain was forced to admire Lawrence's kindness to his wife, although in other respects Lawrence was not a model of conduct.