The lights in the dome went out, and that high white presence dropped back against the sky. Still the people were going by, their feet treading the gravel; and now there was a man’s voice, now a woman’s voice, now the sleepy treble of a child. And they were all in some exquisite faith of destination.
“I guess there must be some other way,” the Inger said.
To the man and the woman in each other’s arms, there came no glimpse of the future, great with its people, “striving who should contribute most to the happiness of mankind.” But of the man’s love was born his dim knowledge – which had long been the woman’s knowledge – that the people are bound together by ties which the nations must cease to break. That the people are heart’s kindred, met here for their world-work, which the nations must cease to interrupt.
Yet all that he could say of this was something which every soldier knows – though armies never know:
“If that woman had been you – and the baby in the shawl had been ours – ”
“Anybody’s!” she insisted. “Anybody’s baby!”
“Yes,” said the Inger then. “Anybody’s baby.!”
notes
1
Jane Addams: “Newer Ideals of Peace.”
2
From Johanne Rambusch, Aalborg, Denmark.
3
From Lida Gustava Heymann, Munich.
4
From “Letters from the Women of the Warring Nations.”
5
From “Letters from the Women of the Warring Nations.”
6
Cotes du Nord, France.
7
From Rosika Schwimmer, Buda Pesth.
8
From Louie Bennett, Dublin.
9
From Emily Hobhouse, London.
10
From Clara Zetkin, Stuttgart.