A SON AT THE FRONT
themselves with Atrocities only in so far as any act of war is one, and that their immediate task was the humdrum one of feeding and clothing the families of the combatants and sending "comforts" to the trenches. He served up, with a somewhat dog-eared eloquence, the usual account of his own experiences, and pressed a modest gift upon the treasurer; but when he departed, after wringing everybody's hands, and leaving the French members bedewed with emotion, Campton had the conviction that their quiet weekly meetings would not often be fluttered by his presence.
Campton was spending an increasing amount of time in the Palais Royal restaurant, where he performed any drudgery for which no initiative was required. Once or twice, when Miss Anthony was submerged by a fresh influx of refugees, he lent her a hand too; and on most days he dropped in late at her office, waited for her to sift and dismiss the last applicants, and saw her home through the incessant rain. It interested him to note that the altruism she had so long wasted on pampered friends was developing into a wise and orderly beneficence. He had always thought of her as an eternal schoolgirl; now she had grown into a woman. Sometimes he fancied the change dated from the moment when their eyes had met across the station, the day they had seen George off. He wondered whether it might not be interesting to paint her new face, if ever painting became again thinkable.
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