`` This past week has been terrible for us all , since the news came of the fighting around Ypres and the battles of Langemarck and St. Julien . Our Canadian boys have done splendidly -- General French says they ` saved the situation , ' when the Germans had all but broken through . But I ca n't feel pride or exultation or anything but a gnawing anxiety over Jem and Jerry and Mr. Grant . The casualty lists are coming out in the papers every day -- oh , there are so many of them . I ca n't bear to read them for fear I 'd find Jem 's name -- for there have been cases where people have seen their boys ' names in the casualty lists before the official telegram came . As for the telephone , for a day or two I just refused to answer it , because I thought I could not endure the horrible moment that came between saying ` Hello ' and hearing the response . That moment seemed a hundred years long , for I was always dreading to hear ` There is a telegram for Dr. Blythe . ' Then , when I had shirked for a while , I was ashamed of leaving it all for mother or Susan , and now I make myself go . But it never gets any easier . Gertrude teaches school and reads compositions and sets examination papers just as she always has done , but I know her thoughts are over in Flanders all the time . Her eyes haunt me . `` And Kenneth is in khaki now , too . He has got a lieutenant 's commission and expects to go overseas in midsummer , so he wrote me . There was n't much else in the letter -- he seemed to be thinking of nothing but going overseas . I shall not see him again before he goes -- perhaps I will never see him again . Sometimes I ask myself if that evening at Four Winds was all a dream . It might as well be -- it seems as if it happened in another life lived years ago -- and everybody has forgotten it but me . `` Walter and Nan and Di came home last night from Redmond . When Walter stepped off the train Dog Monday rushed to meet him , frantic with joy . I suppose he thought Jem would be there , too .
After the first moment , he paid no attention to Walter and his pats , but just stood there , wagging his tail nervously and looking past Walter XXXXX the other people coming out , with eyes that made me choke up , for I could n't help thinking that , for all we knew , Monday might never see Jem come off that train again .
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