THE UNDERCURRENT
play the piano, but there was no heart in the music until she struck up “Tipperary,” when there was a generous chorus in which the men joined.
Hammersley found Doris with Constance Joyliffe in an alcove. At his approach Lady Joyliffe retired.
“Handsome, no end,” he murmured to her as he sank beside her.
“Handsome is as handsome does, Cyril,” she said slowly. “If you knew what I was thinking of, you wouldn’t be so generous.”
“What?”
“Just what everybody is thinking about you—that you’ve got to do something—enlist to fight—go to France, if only as a chauffeur. They’d let you do that tomorrow if you’d go.”
“Chauffeur! Me! Not really!”
“Yes, that or something else,” determinedly.
“Why?”
She hesitated a moment and then went on distinctly.
“Because I could never marry a man people talked about as people are talking about you.”
“Not marry—?” The Honorable Cyril’s face for the first time that evening showed an expression of concern. “Not marry—me? You can’t mean that, Doris.”
“I do mean it, Cyril,” she said firmly. “I can’t marry you.”
“Why?”
“Because to me love is a sacrament. Love of woman—love of country, but the last is the greater of the two. No man who isn’t a patriot is fit to be a husband.”
“A patriot”
She broke in before he could protest. “Yes—a
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