"I went to a Belgian Relief Fund lecture in the Granada ballroom this
afternoon," she said at last. "A Belgian woman--a refugee--spoke in
broken English. The things she told. It was horrible. I wonder if they
could be true?"
"Atrocities?" Carr questioned.
Sophie nodded.
"That's propaganda," her father declared judicially. "We're being
systematically stimulated to ardent support of the war in men and money
through the press and public speaking, through every available avenue
that clever minds can devise. We are not a martial nation, so we have to
be spurred, our emotions aroused. Of course there are atrocities. Is
there an instance in history where an invading army did not commit all
sorts of excesses on enemy soil?"
"I know," Sophie said absently. "But this woman's story--she wasn't one
of your glib platform spouters, flag-waving and calling the Germans
names. She just talked, groping now and then for the right word. And if
a tithe of what she told is true--well, she made me wish I were a man."
One small, soft hand, outstretched over the chair-arm toward the fire,
shut suddenly into a hard little fist. And for a moment Thompson felt
acutely uncomfortable, without knowing why.
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