Now that peace had returned and the war-worn nation was settling down once more, the hospital emptied gradually, the nurses departed, and the owner found herself at last able to indulge her taste for beauty and to remodel the place which for so many months had been a refuge for some of the bravest of all the splendid men who served their country.
Languidly, and like a patient who has undergone a severe operation, England opened her eyes upon Peace once more. It seemed incredible, and for long its unreal aspect was increased by the fact that the officers and men of the vast new armies returned only tardily and in small numbers from their regiments.
Crippled limbs, crippled incomes, crippled businesses were the order of the day; everywhere a brave attempt to hide financial wounds, to triumph over personal sorrow, to set the face steadfastly to the England of the future, wherein so much was changed, so much was gone, never to be replaced; so much, one felt, was in store, but not as yet near fruition.
A good many of the officer patients who had passed through what came to be known as the Orchard Row Hospital had been anxious to persuade Miss Innes to join them in founding at least one family for the future of England. But in vain. Aunt Maud said the war had changed Olwen. It had sobered her. Or was it, perhaps, her illness?
A somewhat severe breakdown followed her foolhardy midnight flight from the Pele. For a long time she was too ill even to write to Mrs. Guyse to thank her for her kindness during her stay. As soon as she was well enough to travel Aunt Maud took her abroad. They had returned to England in the June before war was declared. Since that time so much water had rushed under the bridges of life that one could hardly keep pace with the swift flow of events. Everything personal sank into the background and was lost. The war and the war only had been the preoccupation of existence ever since Olwen became rich. Except in the one direction of helping those she loved, she had not tasted the sweets of wealth. One of her first acts was to make her grandfather resign his living. He now resided, as had always been his ambition, in a pretty and comfortable house at Harrogate in company with Aunt Ada, and was happier than ever in his life.