1
A Woman's War
by Warwick Deeping
AUTHOR OF
"BESS OF THE WOODS"
"THE SLANDERERS"
ETC.
LONDON AND NEW YORK
HARPER & BROTHERS PUBLISHERS
MCMVII
Copyright, 1907, by HARPER & BROTHERS.
All rights reserved. Published June, 1907.
TO COULSON KERNAHAN
MY FATHER'S FRIEND AND MINE
IN MEMORY OF MANY GENEROUS WORDS AND DEEDS
CHAPTER I
THERE was a ripple of chimes through the frosty air as Catherine Murchison turned from King's Walk into Lombard Street, and saw the moon shining white and clear between the black parapets and chimney-stacks of the old houses. St. Antonia's steeple was giving the hour of three, and a babel of lesser tongues answered from the silence of the sleeping town. Hoar-frost glittered on the cypresses that stood in a garden bounding the road, and the roofs were like silver under the hard, moonlit sky.
Catherine Murchison stopped before the great red-brick house with its white window-sashes, and its Georgian air of solidity and comfort. The brass lion's-head on the door seemed to twinkle a welcome to her above the plate that carried her husband's name. She smiled to herself as she drew the latch-key from the pocket under her sables, the happy smile of a woman who comes home with no searchings of the heart. Several shawl-clad figures went gliding along under the shadows of the cypresses, giving her goodnight with a flutter of laughter and tapping of shoes along the stones. Catherine waved her hand to the beshawled ones as they scurried home, and caught a glimps