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And such things put Stacey in good humor. Indeed, among them he enjoyed himself more than later when the first two courses had been served and his father was ready for conversation.

“Poor Jimmy!” Julie was saying. “He was so unhappy not to get across! After he’d gone through officers’ training camp they sent him to Camp Grant and just kept him there the whole time. He was so mad, weren’t you, Jimmy?”

“Well,” said her husband pleasantly, “it was a good deal of a bore to go through all that training and then never have a chance to use it.”

“Oh, it’ll come in handy for the next war,” Stacey observed.

“Oh, Stacey!” his sister cried, “you don’t think there’s going to be another!”

Stacey laughed. “I was only trying to comfort you, Julie. Thought from the way you spoke you’d like to give Jimmy a chance. Just think of it!—there he’d be on a big white horse, waving his sword and charging the enemy, with all his men following him and cheering madly! Wouldn’t you like that?”

Jimmy grinned at his brother-in-law, but Julie shook her head soberly, though perhaps she was only playing at being as ingenuous as all that.