I guess the trouble was in me.”

“But Son, what was it you saw, or heard, that gave you this uneasiness?”

“Nothing, Moms. It was just that the whole setup seemed so slick and well satisfied with themselves, as if they owned the universe. I guess I was just tired. I’ll get a good sleep, and then things will probably look all right to me. But they were really swell to me, offered me more than I expected. I’m to go down tomorrow for a conference and get my bearings on things. My job begins next week, so I’ll have time to get the right clothes. Now go to bed, Moms dear, and don’t you worry about this. It all comes of this old habit of yours that you have to look right through me as if I were made of glass or cellophane, and analyze my innermost thoughts. You’ll have to get over that now I’m a grown man and have been to war. You’ll get us all mixed up if you don’t. I’m not a little kid anymore.”

“I know, Son, I’ll just have to take it out in praying for you.”

“That’s right, Moms, you take it out in praying, but don’t sit up any later tonight to do it. Look what time it is! Let it rest till tomorrow.”

The mother smiled gently.

“Oh, Son, it doesn’t take but a minute to put you and your affairs into the hands of the Lord, and there I can always trust any matter that troubles me.”

She stooped and gently kissed him, and then they parted for the night.

The young man went to his room, made short work of disrobing, and with a sigh of relief he dropped comfortably into his clean, sweet bed. His own home bed, with smooth sheets that smelled of sweet clover and lavender, as his mother’s sheets always did. He drew a breath of thanksgiving for that cleanness and comfort, pushing far from him the memory of other nights not yet so far away, when there were no sheets—or at least not clean ones—and no comfort, relegating with them a hovering memory of disturbing thoughts that had depressed him when he came home. He sank into a deep, dreamless sleep, somehow made possible by that brief talk with his mother.

And the mother was even then softly on her knees beside her bed before her Lord.

“Oh, my Lord,” she was saying, “here is something that I do not know how to deal with. Won’t You take over and manage this? If there is any advice I should give, show me what it should be. If I should keep out of this entirely, then put a guard over my lips. Guide and keep my boy.”

Then she, too, lay down upon her bed and sweetly trusting, slept.

Paige Madison slept late the next morning, after all the excitement of the evening before. He enjoyed the restfulness of being at home again and not having to hurry unduly.

He took great care with his dressing. His best uniform with every button bright and every ribbon in place. In a very few days now he would be done with uniforms and into civilian clothes, but he realized that the uniform counted for something just now, his first day in his new job. It would mean something to his fellow workmen, to his employers, to the officials about the place. It gave him a bit of prestige, timely interest, a certain standing to start out with.

His mother, too, looked proudly at him as he came downstairs, and motioned him to the late breakfast she had prepared for him. How proud she was of him, how glad he was safely at home! She put aside the twinge of fear that crossed her mind as she thought of all the temptations and discouragements that awaited him in this new-old world to which he had returned. She must not fear. She had trusted him to her Lord, and He would guide.

“What’s new, Moms?” Paige asked as he drained the orange juice with relish and put down the glass. “You know, I’ve hardly had time to ask you any questions since I got home, what with all this to-do about hunting a job. Is everything hereabouts the same as ever? No marriages or births or deaths?”

“Yes.” The mother looked thoughtful. “Nettie Hollister got married to a lieutenant stationed in India and went out there with him.