Transcriber's note:

 Chapter numbering skips Chapter XI in the printed text. The original numbering has been retained in this transcription. 

THE SEARCH

by

GRACE LIVINGSTON HILL

Grosset & DunlapPublishers New York

Made in the United States of America

Copyright, 1919, By The Christian HeraldCopyright, 1919, By J. B. Lippincott Company

Printed in the United States of America

THE SEARCH

THE SEARCH

I

Two young men in officers' uniforms entered the smoker of a suburbantrain, and after the usual formalities of matches and cigarettes settledback to enjoy their ride out to Bryne Haven. 

"What d'ye think of that girl I introduced you to the other night, Harry?Isn't she a pippin?" asked the second lieutenant taking a luxurious puffat his cigarette. 

"I should say, Bobbie, she's some girl! Where d'ye pick her up? Icertainly owe you one for a good time. "

"Don't speak of it, Harry. Come on with me and try it again. I'm going tosee her friend to-night and can get her over the 'phone any time. She'sjust nuts about you. What do you say? Shall I call her up?"

"Well, hardly to-night, Bob, " said the first lieutenant thoughtfully, "she's a ripping fine girl and all that, of course, but the fact is, Bob, I've decided to marry Ruth Macdonald and I haven't much time left beforeI go over. I think I'll have to get things fixed up between us to-night, you see. Perhaps--later----. But no. I guess that wouldn't do. Ruth'sfolks are rather fussy about such things. It might get out. No, Bob, I'llhave to forego the pleasures you offer me this time. "

The second lieutenant sat up and whistled:

"You've decided to marry Ruth Macdonald!" he ejaculated, staring. "Buthas Ruth Macdonald decided to marry you?"

"I hardly think there'll be any trouble on that score when I get ready topropose, " smiled the first lieutenant complacently, as he lolled back inhis seat. "You seem surprised, " he added. 

"Well, rather!" said the other officer dryly, still staring. 

"What's there so surprising about that?" The first lieutenant wasenjoying the sensation he was creating. He knew that the secondlieutenant had always been "sweet" on Ruth Macdonald. 

"Well, you know, Harry, you're pretty rotten!" said the second lieutenantuneasily, a flush beginning to rise in his face. "I didn't think you'dhave the nerve. She's a mighty fine girl, you know. She's--_unusual_!"

"Exactly. Didn't you suppose I would want a fine girl when I marry?"

"I don't believe you're really going to do it!" burst forth the secondlieutenant. "In fact, I don't believe I'll _let_ you do it if you try!"

"You couldn't stop me, Bob!" with an amiable sneer. "One word from you, young man, and I'd put your captain wise about where you were the lasttime you overstayed your leave and got away with it. You know I've got apull with your captain. It never pays for the pot to call the kettleblack. "

The second lieutenant sat back sullenly with a deep red streaking hischeeks. 

"You're no angel yourself, Bob, see?" went on the first lieutenant lyingback in his seat in satisfied triumph, "and I'm going to marry RuthMacdonald next week and get a ten days' leave! Put that in your pipe andsmoke it!"

There ensued a long and pregnant silence. One glance at the secondlieutenant showed that he was most effectually silenced. 

The front door of the car slammed open and shut, and a tall slim officerwith touches of silver about the edges of his dark hair, and a look ofcommand in his keen eyes came crisply down the aisle. The two younglieutenants sat up with a jerk, and an undertone of oaths, and preparedto salute as he passed them. The captain gave them a quick searchingglance as he saluted and went on to the next car. 

The two jerked out salutes and settled back uneasily. 

"That man gives me a pain!" said Harry Wainwright preparing to soothe hisruffled spirits by a fresh cigarette. 

"He thinks he's so doggone good himself that he has to pry into otherpeople's business and get them in wrong. It beats me how he ever got tobe a captain--a prim old fossil like him!"

"It might puzzle some people to know how you got your commission, Harry. You're no fossil, of course, but you're no angel, either, and there aresome things in your career that aren't exactly laid down in militarymanuals. "

"Oh, my uncle Henry looked after my commission. It was a cinch! He thinksthe sun rises and sets in me, and he had no idea how he perjured himselfwhen he put me through. Why, I've got some of the biggest men in thecountry for my backers, and wouldn't they lie awake at night if they knew!Oh Boy! I thought I'd croak when I read some of those recommendations, they fairly gushed with praise. You'd have died laughing, Bob, if you hadread them. They had such adjectives as 'estimable, moral, active, efficient, ' and one went so far as to say that I was equally distinguishedin college in scholarship and athletics! Some stretch of imagination, eh, what?"

The two laughed loudly over this. 

"And the best of it is, " continued the first lieutenant, "the poor boobbelieved it was all true!"

"But your college records, Harry, how could they get around those? Ordidn't they look you up?"

"Oh, mother fixed that all up. She sent the college a good fat check toestablish a new scholarship or something. "

"Lucky dog!" sighed his friend. "Now I'm just the other way. I never tryto put anything over but I get caught, and nobody ever tried to cover upmy tracks for me when I got gay!"

"You worry too much, Bobby, and you never take a chance. Now _I_----"

The front door of the car opened and shut with a slam, and a tall youngfellow with a finely cut face and wearing workman's clothes entered. Hegave one quick glance down the car as though he was searching forsomeone, and came on down the aisle. The sight of him stopped the boaston young Wainwright's tongue, and an angry flush grew, and rolled up fromthe top of his immaculate olive-drab collar to his close, militaryhair-cut. 

Slowly, deliberately, John Cameron walked down the aisle of the carlooking keenly from side to side, scanning each face alertly, until hiseyes lighted on the two young officers. At Bob Wetherill he merelyglanced knowingly, but he fixed his eyes on young Wainwright with asteady, amused, contemptuous gaze as he came toward him; a gaze sonoticeable that it could not fail to arrest the attention of any who werelooking; and he finished the affront with a lingering turn of his head ashe passed by, and a slight accentuation of the amusement as he finallylifted his gaze and passed on out of the rear door of the car. Those whowere sitting in the seats near the door might have heard the words: "Andthey _killed_ such men as Lincoln!" muttered laughingly as the doorslammed shut behind him. 

Lieutenant Wainwright uttered a low oath of imprecation and flung hishalf spent cigarette on the floor angrily:

"Did you see that, Bob?" he complained furiously, "If I don't get thatfellow!"

"I certainly did! Are you going to stand for that? What's eating him, anyway? Has he got it in for you again? But _he_ isn't a very easy fellowto get, you know. He has the reputation----"

"Oh, I know! Yes, I guess anyhow _I know_!"

"Oh, I see! Licked you, too, once, did he?" laughed Wetherill, "what hadyou been up to?"

"Oh, having some fun with his girl! At least I suppose she must have beenhis girl the way he carried on about it. He said he didn't know her, butof course that was all bluff. Then, too, I called his father a name hedidn't like and he lit into me again. Good night! I thought that was theend of little Harry! I was sick for a week after he got through with me. He certainly is some brute. Of course, I didn't realize what I was upagainst at first or I'd have got the upper hand right away. I could have, you know! I've been trained! But I didn't want to hurt the fellow and getinto the papers. You see, the circumstances were peculiar just then----"

"I see! You'd just applied for Officer's Training Camp?"

"Exactly, and you know you never can tell what rumor a person like thatcan start. He's keen enough to see the advantage, of course, and followit up. Oh, he's got one coming to him all right!"

"Yes, he's keen all right. That's the trouble. It's hard to get him. "

"Well, just wait. I've got him now. If I don't make him bite the dust! Yegods! When I think of the way he looks at me every time he sees me Icould skin him alive!"

"I fancy he'd be rather slippery to skin. I wouldn't like to try it, Harry!"

"Well, but wait till you see where I've got him! He's in the draft. Hegoes next week. And they're sending all those men to our camp! He'll be aprivate, of course, and he'll have to _salute me_! Won't that gall him?"

"He won't do it! I know him, and _he won't do it_!"

"I'll take care that he does it all right! I'll put myself in his way and_make_ him do it. And if he refuses I'll report him and get him in theguard house. See? I can, you know. Then I guess he'll smile out of theother side of his mouth!"

"He won't likely be in your company. "

"That doesn't make any difference. I can get him into trouble if heisn't, but I'll try to work it that he is if I can. I've got 'pull, ' youknow, and I know how to 'work' my superiors!" he swaggered. 

"That isn't very good policy, " advised the other, "I've heard of menpicking off officers they didn't like when it came to battle. "

"I'll take good care that he's in front of me on all such occasions!"

A sudden nudge from his companion made him look up, and there lookingsharply down at him, was the returning captain, and behind him walkedJohn Cameron still with that amused smile on his face. It was plain thatthey had both heard his boast. His face crimsoned and he jerked out atardy salute, as the two passed on leaving him muttering imprecationsunder his breath. 

When the front door slammed behind the two Wainwright spoke in a lowshaken growl:

"Now what in thunder is that Captain La Rue going on to Bryne Haven for?I thought, of course, he got off at Spring Heights. That's where hismother lives. I'll bet he is going up to see Ruth Macdonald! You knowthey're related. If he is, that knocks my plans all into a cocked hat. I'd have to sit at attention all the evening, and I couldn't propose withthat cad around!"

"Better put it off then and come with me, " soothed his friend. "AthalieBritt will help you forget your troubles all right, and there's plenty oftime. You'll get another leave soon. "

"How the dickens did John Cameron come to be on speaking terms withCaptain La Rue, I'd like to know?" mused Wainwright, paying no heed tohis friend. 

"H'm! That does complicate matters for you some, doesn't it? Captain LaRue is down at your camp, isn't he? Why, I suppose Cameron knew him up atcollege, perhaps. Cap used to come up from the university every week lastwinter to lecture at college. "

Wainwright muttered a chain of choice expletives known only to men of hiskind. 

"Forget it!" encouraged his friend slapping him vigorously on theshoulder as the train drew into Bryne Haven. "Come off that grouch andget busy! You're on leave, man! If you can't visit one woman there'splenty more, and time enough to get married, too, before you go toFrance. Marriage is only an incident, anyway. Why make such a fuss aboutit?"

By the fitful glare of the station lights they could see that Cameron waswalking with the captain just ahead of them in the attitude of familiarconverse. The sight did not put Wainwright into a better humor. 

At the great gate of the Macdonald estate Cameron and La Rue parted. Theycould hear the last words of their conversation as La Rue swung into thewide driveway and Cameron started on up the street:

"I'll attend to it the first thing in the morning, Cameron, and I'm gladyou spoke to me about it! I don't see any reason why it shouldn't gothrough! I shall be personally gratified if we can make the arrangement. Good-night and good luck to you!"

The two young officers halted at a discreet distance until John Cameronhad turned off to the right and walked away into the darkness. Thecaptain's quick step could be heard crunching along the gravel drive tothe Macdonald house. 

"Well, I guess that about settles me for the night, Bobbie!" sighedWainwright. "Come on, let's pass the time away somehow. I'll stop at thedrug store to 'phone and make a date with Ruth for to-morrow morning. Wonder where I can get a car to take her out? No, I don't want to go inher car because she always wants to run it herself. When you're proposingto a woman you don't want her to be absorbed in running a car. See?"

"I don't know. I haven't so much experience in that line as you have, Harry, but I should think it might be inconvenient, " laughed the other. 

They went back to the station. A few minutes later Wainwright emergedfrom the telephone booth in the drug store with a lugubrious expression. 

"Doggone my luck! She's promised to go to church with that smug cousin ofhers, and she's busy all the rest of the day. But she's promised to giveme next Saturday if I can get off!" His face brightened with the thought. 

"I guess I can make it. If I can't do anything else I'll tell 'em I'mgoing to be married, and then I can make her rush things through, perhaps. Girls are game for that sort of thing just now; it's in the air, these war marriages. By George, I'm not sure but that's the best way towork it after all. She's the kind of a girl that would do almost anythingto help you out of a fix that way, and I'll just tell her I had to saythat to get off and that I'll be court-martialed if they find out itwasn't so. How about it?"

"I don't know, Harry. It's all right, of course, if you can get away withit, but Ruth's a pretty bright girl and has a will of her own, you know. But now, come on. It's getting late. What do you say if we get up a partyand run down to Atlantic City over Sunday, now that you're free? I knowthose two girls would be tickled to death to go, especially Athalie. She's a Westerner, you know, and has never seen the ocean. "

"All right, come on, only you must promise there won't be any scrapesthat will get me into the papers and blow back to Bryne Haven. You knowthere's a lot of Bryne Haven people go to Atlantic City this time of yearand I'm not going to have any stories started. _I'm going to marry RuthMacdonald!_"

"All right. Come on. "

II

Ruth Macdonald drew up her little electric runabout sharply at thecrossing, as the station gates suddenly clanged down in her way, and satback with a look of annoyance on her face. 

Michael of the crossing was so overcareful sometimes that it becametrying. She was sure there was plenty of time to cross before the downtrain. She glanced at her tiny wrist watch and frowned. Why, it was fullyfive minutes before the train was due! What could Michael mean, standingthere with his flag so importantly and that determined look upon hisface?

She glanced down the platform and was surprised to find a crowd. Theremust be a special expected. What was it? A convention of some sort? Or apicnic? It was late in the season for picnics, and not quite soon enoughfor a college football game. Who were they, anyway? She looked them overand was astonished to find people of every class, the workers, thewealthy, the plain every-day men, women and children, all with a waitingattitude and a strange seriousness upon them. As she looked closer shesaw tears on some faces and handkerchiefs everywhere in evidence. Hadsome one died? Was this a funeral train they were awaiting? Strange shehad not heard!

Then the band suddenly burst out upon her with the familiar wail:

 There's a long, long trail awinding, Into the land of our dreams, --

and behind came the muffled tramping of feet not accustomed to marchingtogether. 

Ruth suddenly sat up very straight and began to watch, an unfamiliar aweupon her. This must be the first draft men just going away! Of course!Why had she not thought of it at once. She had read about their going andheard people mention it the last week, but it had not entered much intoher thoughts. She had not realized that it would be a ceremony of publicinterest like this. She had no friends whom it would touch. The young menof her circle had all taken warning in plenty of time and foundthemselves a commission somewhere, two of them having settled up mattersbut a few days before. She had thought of these draft men, when she hadthought of them at all, only when she saw mention of them in thenewspapers, and then as a lot of workingmen or farmers' boys who werereluctant to leave their homes and had to be forced into patriotism inthis way. It had not occurred to her that there were many honorable youngmen who would take this way of putting themselves at the disposal oftheir country in her time of need, without attempting to feather a nicelittle nest for themselves. Now she watched them seriously and found toher astonishment that she knew many of them. There were three collegefellows in the front ranks whom she had met. She had danced with them andbeen taken out to supper by them, and had a calling acquaintance withtheir sisters. The sister of one stood on the sidewalk now in the commoncrowd, quite near to the runabout, and seemed to have forgotten thatanybody was by. Her face was drenched with tears and her lips werequivering. Behind her was a gray-haired woman with a skewey blouse and afaded dark blue serge skirt too long for the prevailing fashion. Thetears were trickling down her cheeks also; and an old man with a crutch, and a little round-eyed girl, seemed to belong to the party. The oldman's lips were set and he was looking at the boys with his heart in hiseyes. 

Ruth shrank back not to intrude upon such open sorrow, and glanced at theline again as they straggled down the road to the platform; fiftyserious, grave-eyed young men with determined mien and sorrow in the verydroop of their shoulders. One could see how they hated all this publicityand display, this tense moment of farewell in the eyes of the town; andyet how tender they felt toward those dear ones who had gathered thus todo them honor as they went away to do their part in the greatworld-struggle for liberty. 

As she looked closer the girl saw they were not mature men as at firstglance they had seemed, but most of them mere boys. There was the boythat mowed the Macdonald lawn, and the yellow-haired grocery boy. Therewas the gas man and the nice young plumber who fixed the leak in thewater pipes the other day, and the clerk from the post office, and thecashier from the bank! What made them look so old at first sight? Why, itwas as if sorrow and responsibility had suddenly been put upon them likea garment that morning for a uniform, and they walked in the shadow ofthe great sadness that had come upon the world. She understood thatperhaps even up to the very day before, they had most of them been merry, careless boys; but now they were men, made so in a night by the horrible_sin_ that had brought about this thing called War. 

For the first time since the war began Ruth Macdonald had a vision ofwhat the war meant. She had been knitting, of course, with all the rest;she had spent long mornings at the Red Cross rooms--she was on her waythere this very minute when Michael and the procession had interruptedher course--she had made miles of surgical dressings and picked tons ofoakum. She had bade her men friends cheery good-byes when they went toOfficers' Training Camps, and with the other girls welcomed and admiredtheir uniforms when they came home on short furloughs, one by one winninghis stripes and commission. They were all men whom she had known insociety. They had wealth and position and found it easy to get into thekind of thing that pleased them in the army or navy. The danger they werefacing seemed hardly a negligible quantity. It was the fashion to look onit that way. Ruth had never thought about it before. She had even beensevere in her judgment of a few mothers who worried about their sons andwanted to get them exempt in some way. But these stern loyal mothers whostood in close ranks with heavy lines of sacrifice upon their faces, tears on their cheeks, love and self-abnegation in their eyes, gave her anew view of the world. These were the ones who would be in actualpoverty, some of them, without their boys, and whose lives would be emptyindeed when they went forth. Ruth Macdonald had never before realized thesuffering this war was causing individuals until she saw the faces ofthose women with their sons and brothers and lovers; until she saw thefaces of the brave boys, for the moment all the rollicking lightnessgone, and only the pain of parting and the mists of the unknown future intheir eyes. 

It came to the girl with a sudden pang that she was left out of all this. That really it made little difference to her whether America was in thewar or not. Her life would go on just the same--a pleasant monotony ofbustle and amusement. There would be the same round of social affairs andregular engagements, spiced with the excitement of war work andoccasional visiting uniforms. There was no one going forth from theirhome to fight whose going would put the light of life out for her andcause her to feel sad, beyond the ordinary superficial sadness for theabsence of one's playmates. 

She liked them all, her friends, and shrank from having them in danger;although it was splendid to have them doing something real at last. Intruth until this moment the danger had seemed so remote; the casualtylist of which people spoke with bated breath so much a thing of vastunknown numbers, that it had scarcely come within her realization as yet. But now she suddenly read the truth in the suffering eyes of these peoplewho were met to say good-bye, perhaps a last good-bye, to those who weredearer than life to them. How would she, Ruth Macdonald, feel, if one ofthose boys were her brother or lover? It was inconceivably dreadful. 

The band blared on, and the familiar words insisted themselves upon herunwilling mind:

 There's a long, long night of waiting!

A sob at her right made her start and then turn away quickly from thesight of a mother's grief as she clung to a frail daughter for support, sobbing with utter abandon, while the daughter kept begging her to "becalm for Tom's sake. "

It was all horrible! Why had she gotten into this situation? Aunt Rhodawould blame her for it. Aunt Rhoda would say it was too conspicuous, right there in the front ranks! She put her hand on the starter andglanced out, hoping to be able to back out and get away, but the roadbehind was blocked several deep with cars, and the crowd had closed inupon her and about her on every side. Retreat was impossible. However, she noticed with relief that the matter of being conspicuous need nottrouble her. Nobody was looking her way. All eyes were turned in onedirection, toward that straggling, determined line that wound up from theBorough Hall, past the Post Office and Bank to the station where the HomeGuards stood uniformed, in open silent ranks doing honor to the boys whowere going to fight for them. 

Ruth's eyes went reluctantly back to the marching line again. Somehow itstruck her that they would not have seemed so forlorn if they had wornnew trig uniforms, instead of rusty varied civilian clothes. They seemedlike an ill-prepared sacrifice passing in review. Then suddenly her gazewas riveted upon a single figure, the last man in the procession, marching alone, with uplifted head and a look of self-abnegation on hisstrong young face. All at once something sharp seemed to slash throughher soul and hold her with a long quiver of pain and she sat lookingstraight ahead staring with a kind of wild frenzy at John Cameron walkingalone at the end of the line. 

She remembered him in her youngest school days, the imp of the grammarschool, with a twinkle in his eye and an irrepressible grin on his handsomeface. Nothing had ever daunted him and no punishment had ever stopped hismischief. He never studied his lessons, yet he always seemed to know enoughto carry him through, and would sometimes burst out with astonishingknowledge where others failed. But there was always that joke on his lipsand that wide delightful grin that made him the worshipped-afar of all thelittle girls. He had dropped a rose on her desk once as he lounged late andlaughing to his seat after recess, apparently unaware that his teacher wascalling him to order. She could feel the thrill of her little childishheart now as she realized that he had given the rose to her. The next termshe was sent to a private school and saw no more of him save an occasionalglimpse in passing him on the street, but she never had forgotten him; andnow and then she had heard little scraps of news about him. He was workinghis way through college. He was on the football team and the baseball team. She knew vaguely that his father had died and their money was gone, butbeyond that she had no knowledge of him. They had drifted apart. He was notof her world, and gossip about him seldom came her way. He had long agoceased to look at her when they happened to pass on the street. Hedoubtless had forgotten her, or thought she had forgotten him. Or, it mighteven be that he did not wish to presume upon an acquaintance begun when shewas too young to have a choice of whom should be her friends. But thememory of that rose had never quite faded from her heart even though shehad been but seven, and always she had looked after him when she chanced tosee him on the street with a kind of admiration and wonder. Now suddenlyshe saw him in another light. The laugh was gone from his lips and thetwinkle from his eyes. He looked as he had looked the day he fought ChuckWoodcock for tying a string across the sidewalk and tripping up the littlegirls on the way to school. It came to her like a revelation that he wasgoing forth now in just such a way to fight the world-foe. In a way he wasgoing to fight for her. To make the world a safe place for girls such asshe! All the terrible stories of Belgium flashed across her mind, and shewas lifted on a great wave of gratitude to this boy friend of her babyhoodfor going out to defend her!

All the rest of the straggling line of draft men were going out for thesame purpose perhaps, but it did not occur to her that they were anythingto her until she saw John Cameron. All those friends of her own world whowere training for officers, they, too, were going to fight in the sameway to defend the world, but she had not thought of it in that waybefore. It took a sight of John Cameron's high bearing and serious faceto bring the knowledge to her mind. 

She thought no longer of trying to get away. She seemed held to the spotby a new insight into life. She could not take her eyes from the face ofthe young man. She forgot that she was staying, forgot that she wasstaring. She could no more control the swelling thoughts of horror thatsurged over her and took possession of her than she could have controlleda mob if it had suddenly swept down upon her. 

The gates presently lifted silently to let the little procession passover to her side of the tracks, and within a few short minutes thespecial train that was to bear the men away to camp came rattling up, laden with other victims of the chance that sent some men on ahead to bepioneers in the camps. 

These were a noisy jolly bunch. Perhaps, having had their own sadpartings they were only trying to brace themselves against the scenes ofother partings through which they must pass all the way along the line. They must be reminded of their own mothers and sisters and sweethearts. Something of this Ruth Macdonald seemed to define to herself as, startledand annoyed by the clamor of the strangers in the midst of the sacrednessof the moment, she turned to look at the crowding heads in the carwindows and caught the eye of an irrepressible youth:

"Think of me over there!" he shouted, waving a flippant hand andtwinkling his eyes at the beautiful girl in her car. 

Another time Ruth would have resented such familiarity, but now somethingtouched her spirit with an inexpressible pity, and she let a tiny rippleof a smile pass over her lovely face as her eyes traveled on down theplatform in search of the tall form of John Cameron. In the moment of theoncoming train she had somehow lost sight of him. Ah! There he wasstooping over a little white haired woman, taking her tenderly in hisarms to kiss her. The girl's eyes lingered on him. His whole attitude wassuch a revelation of the man the rollicking boy had become. It seemed topleasantly round out her thought of him. 

The whistle sounded, the drafted men gave one last wringing hand-clasp, one last look, and sprang on board. 

John Cameron was the last to board the train. He stood on the lower stepof the last car as it began to move slowly. His hat was lifted, and hestood with slightly lifted chin and eyes that looked as if they hadsounded the depths of all sadness and surrendered himself to whatever hadbeen decreed. There was settled sorrow in all the lines of his fine face. Ruth was startled by the change in it; by the look of the boy in the man. Had the war done that for him just in one short summer? Had it done thatfor the thousands who were going to fight for her? And she was sitting inher luxurious car with a bundle of wool at her feet, and presuming tobear her part by mere knitting! Poor little useless woman that she was! Athing to send a man forth from everything he counted dear or wanted todo, into suffering and hardship--and _death_--perhaps! She shuddered asshe watched his face with its strong uplifted look, and its unutterablesorrow. She had not thought he could look like that! Oh, he would be gayto-morrow, like the rest, of course, with his merry jest and hiscontagious grin, and making light of the serious business of war! Hewould not be the boy he used to be without the ability to do that. Butshe would never forget how he had looked in this farewell minute while hewas gazing his last on the life of his boyhood and being borne away intoa dubious future. She felt a hopelessly yearning, as if, had there beentime, she would have liked to have told him how much she appreciated hisdoing this great deed for her and for all her sisters!

Has it ever been fully explained why the eyes of one person looking hardacross a crowd will draw the eyes of another?

The train had slipped along ten feet or more and was gaining speed whenJohn Cameron's eyes met those of Ruth Macdonald, and her vivid speakingface flashed its message to his soul. A pleased wonder sprang into hiseyes, a question as his glance lingered, held by the tumult in her face, and the unmistakable personality of her glance. Then his face lit up withits old smile, graver, oh, much! and more deferential than it used to be, with a certain courtliness in it that spoke of maturity of spirit. Helifted his hat a little higher and waved it just a trifle in recognitionof her greeting, wondering in sudden confusion if he were really notmistaken after all and had perhaps been appropriating a farewell thatbelonged to someone else; then amazed and pleased at the flutter of herhandkerchief in reply. 

The train was moving rapidly now in the midst of a deep throaty cheerthat sounded more like a sob, and still he stood on that bottom step withhis hat lifted and let his eyes linger on the slender girlish figure inthe car, with the morning sun glinting across her red-gold hair, and thebeautiful soft rose color in her cheeks. 

As the train swept past the little shelter shed he bethought himself andturned a farewell tender smile on the white-haired woman who stoodwatching him through a mist of tears. Then his eyes went back for onelast glimpse of the girl; and so he flashed out of sight around thecurve. 

III

It had taken only a short time after all. The crowd drowned its cheer inone deep gasp of silence and broke up tearfully into little groupsbeginning to melt away at the sound of Michael ringing up the gates, andtelling the cars and wagons to hurry that it was almost time for theup-train. 

Ruth Macdonald started her car and tried to bring her senses back totheir normal calm wondering what had happened to her and why there wassuch an inexpressible mingling of loss and pleasure in her heart. 

The way at first was intricate with congestion of traffic and Ruth wasobliged to go slowly. As the road cleared before her she was about toglide forward and make up for lost time. Suddenly a bewildered littlewoman with white hair darted in front of the car, hesitated, drew back, came on again. Ruth stopped the car shortly, much shaken with the swiftvision of catastrophe, and the sudden recognition of the woman. It wasthe same one who had been with John Cameron. 

"Oh, I'm so sorry I startled you!" she called pleasantly, leaning out ofthe car. "Won't you get in, please, and let me take you home?"

The woman looked up and there were great tears in her eyes. It was plainwhy she had not seen where she was going. 

"Thank you, no, I couldn't!" she said with a choke in her voice andanother blur of tears, "I--you see--I want to get away--I've been seeingoff my boy!"

"I know!" said Ruth with quick sympathy, "I saw. And you want to get homequickly and cry. I feel that way myself. But you see I didn't haveanybody there and I'd like to do a little something just to be in it. Won't you please get in? You'll get home sooner if I take you; and see!We're blocking the way!"

The woman cast a frightened glance about and assented:

"Of course. I didn't realize!" she said climbing awkwardly in and sittingbolt upright as uncomfortable as could be in the luxurious car beside thegirl. It was all too plain she did not wish to be there. 

Ruth manoeuvred her car quickly out of the crowd and into a side street, gliding from there to the avenue. She did not speak until they had leftthe melting crowd well behind them. Then she turned timidly to the woman:

"You--are--his--_mother_?"

She spoke the words hesitatingly as if she feared to touch a wound. Thewoman's eyes suddenly filled again and a curious little quiver came onthe strong chin. 

"Yes, " she tried to say and smothered the word in her handkerchiefpressed quickly to her lips in an effort to control them. 

Ruth laid a cool little touch on the woman's other hand that lay in herlap:

"Please forgive me!" she said, "I wasn't sure. I know it must beawful, --cruel--for you!"

"He--is all I have left!" the woman breathed with a quick controlledgasp, "but, of course--it was--right that he should go!"

She set her lips more firmly and blinked off at the blur of pretty homeson her right without seeing any of them. 

"He would have gone sooner, only he thought he ought not to leave me tillhe had to, " she said with another proud little quiver in her voice, as ifhaving once spoken she must go on and say more, "I kept telling him Iwould get on all right--but he always was so careful of me--ever sincehis father died!"

"Of course!" said Ruth tenderly turning her face away to struggle with astrange smarting sensation in her own eyes and throat. Then in a lowvoice she added:

"I knew him, you know. I used to go to the same school with him when Iwas a little bit of a girl. "

The woman looked up with a quick searching glance and brushed the tearsaway firmly. 

"Why, aren't you Ruth Macdonald? _Miss_ Macdonald, I mean--excuse me! Youlive in the big house on the hill, don't you?"

"Yes, I'm Ruth Macdonald. Please don't call me Miss. I'm only nineteenand I still answer to my little girl name, " Ruth answered with a charmingsmile. 

The woman's gaze softened. 

"I didn't know John knew you, " she said speculatively. "He nevermentioned----"

"Of course not!" said the girl anticipating, "he wouldn't. It was a longtime ago when I was seven and I doubt if he remembers me any more. Theytook me out of the public school the next year and sent me to St. Mary'sfor which I've never quite forgiven them, for I'm sure I should have goton much faster at the public school and I loved it. But I've notforgotten the good times I had there, and John was always good to thelittle girls. We all liked him. I haven't seen him much lately, but Ishould think he would have grown to be just what you say he is. He looksthat way. "

Again the woman's eyes searched her face, as if she questioned thesincerity of her words; then apparently satisfied she turned away with asigh:

"I'd have liked him to know a girl like you, " she said wistfully. 

"Thank you!" said Ruth brightly, "that sounds like a real compliment. Perhaps we shall know each other yet some day if fortune favors us. I'mquite sure he's worth knowing. "

"Oh, he is!" said the little mother, her tears brimming over again andflowing down her dismayed cheeks, "he's quite worth the best societythere is, but I haven't been able to manage a lot of things for him. Ithasn't been always easy to get along since his father died. Somethinghappened to our money. But anyway, he got through college!" with a flashof triumph in her eyes. 

"Wasn't that fine!" said Ruth with sparkling eyes, "I'm sure he's worth alot more than some of the fellows who have always had every whimgratified. Now, which street? You'll have to tell me. I'm ashamed to sayI don't know this part of town very well. Isn't it pretty down here? Thishouse? What a wonderful clematis! I never saw such a wealth of bloom. "

"Yes, John planted that and fussed over it, " said his mother with prideas she slipped unaccustomedly out of the car to the sidewalk. "I'm veryglad to have met you and it was most kind of you to bring me home. Totell the truth"--with a roguish smile that reminded Ruth of her son'sgrin--"I was so weak and trembling with saying good-bye and trying tokeep up so John wouldn't know it, that I didn't know how I was to gethome. Though I'm afraid I was a bit discourteous. I couldn't bear thethought of talking to a stranger just then. But you haven't been like astranger--knowing him, and all----"

"Oh, thank you!" said Ruth, "it's been so pleasant. Do you know, I don'tbelieve I ever realized what an awful thing the war is till I saw thosepeople down at the station this morning saying good-bye. I never realizedeither what a useless thing I am. I haven't even anybody very dear tosend. I can only knit. "

"Well, that's a good deal. Some of us haven't time to do that. I neverhave a minute. "

"You don't need to, you've given your son, " said Ruth flashing a glanceof glorified understanding at the woman. 

A beautiful smile came out on the tired sorrowful face. 

"Yes, I've given him, " she said, "but I'm hoping God will give him backagain some day. Do you think that's too much to hope. He is such a goodboy!"

"Of course not, " said Ruth sharply with a sudden sting of apprehension inher soul. And then she remembered that she had no very intimateacquaintance with God. She wished she might be on speaking terms, atleast, and she would go and present a plea for this lonely woman. If itwere only Captain La Rue, her favorite cousin, or even the President, shemight consider it. But God! She shuddered. Didn't God let this awful warbe? Why did He do it? She had never thought much about God before. 

"I wish you would let me come to see you sometime and take you foranother ride, " she said sweetly. 

"It would be beautiful!" said the older woman, "if you would care to takethe time from your own friends. "

"I would love to have you for one of my friends, " said the girlgracefully. 

The woman smiled wistfully. 

"I'm only here holidays and evenings, " she conceded, "I'm doing somegovernment work now. "

"I shall come, " said Ruth brightly. "I've enjoyed you ever so much. " Thenshe started her car and whirled away into the sunshine. 

"She won't come, of course, " said the woman to herself as she stoodlooking mournfully after the car, reluctant to go into the empty house. "I wish she would! Isn't she just like a flower! How wonderful it wouldbe if things had been different, and there hadn't been any war, and myboy could have had her for a friend! Oh!"

 * * * * *

Down at the Club House the women waited for the fair young member who hadcharge of the wool. They rallied her joyously as she hurried in, suddenlyaware that she had kept them all waiting. 

"I saw her in the crowd at the station this morning, " called out Mrs. Pryor, a large placid tease with a twinkle in her eye. "She was pickingout the handsomest man for the next sweater she knits. Which one did youchoose, Miss Ruth? Tell us. Are you going to write him a letter and stickit in the toe of his sock?"

The annoyed color swept into Ruth's face, but she paid no other heed asshe went about her morning duties, preparing the wool to give out. Athought had stolen into her heart that made a tumult there and would notbear turning over even in her mind in the presence of all these curiouspeople. She put it resolutely by as she taught newcomers how to turn theheel of a sock, but now and then it crept back again and was the cause ofher dropping an occasional stitch. 

Dottie Wetherill came to find out what was the matter with her sock, andto giggle and gurgle about her brother Bob and his friends. Bob, itappeared, was going to bring five officers home with him next week endand they were to have a dance Saturday night. Of course Ruth must come. Bob was soon to get his _first_ lieutenant's commission. There had been amistake, of course, or he would have had it before this, some favoritismshown; but now Bob had what they called a "pull, " and things were goingto be all right for him. Bob said you couldn't get anywhere without a"pull. " And didn't Ruth think Bob looked perfectly fine in his uniform?

It annoyed Ruth to hear such talk and she tried to make it plain toDottie that she was mistaken about "pull. " There was no such thing. Itwas all imagination. She knew, for her cousin, Captain La Rue, was veryclose to the Government and he had told her so. He said that real worthwas always recognized, and that it didn't make any difference where itwas found or who your friends were. It mattered _what you were_. 

She fixed Dottie's sock and moved on to the wool table to get ready anallotment for some of the ladies to take home. 

Mrs. Wainwright bustled in, large and florid and well groomed, with abunch of photographer's proofs of her son Harry in his uniform. Shecalled loudly for Ruth to come and inspect them. There were some twentyor more poses, each one seemingly fatter, more pompous and conceitedlooking than the last. She stated in boisterous good humor that Harryparticularly wanted Ruth's opinion before he gave the order. At that Mrs. Pryor bent her head to her neighbor and nodded meaningly, as if a certainmatter of discussion were settled now beyond all question. Ruth caughtthe look and its meaning and the color flooded her face once more, muchto her annoyance. She wondered angrily if she would never be able to stopthat childish habit of blushing, and why it annoyed her so very much thismorning to have her name coupled with that of Harry Wainwright. He washer old friend and playmate, having lived next door to her all her life, and it was but natural when everybody was sweethearting and gettingmarried, that people should speak of her and wonder whether there mightbe anything more to their relationship than mere friendship. Still itannoyed her. Continually as she turned the pages from one fat smugWainwright countenance to another, she saw in a mist the face of anotherman, with uplifted head and sorrowful eyes. She wondered if when the timecame for Harry Wainwright to go he would have aught of the vision, andaught of the holiness of sorrow that had shown in that other face. 

She handed the proofs back to the mother, so like her son in her ampleblandness, and wondered if Mrs. Cameron would have a picture of her sonin his uniform, fine and large and lifelike as these were. 

She interrupted her thoughts to hear Mrs. Wainwright's clarion voicelifted in parting from the door of the Club House on her way back to hercar:

"Well, good-bye, Ruth dear. Don't hesitate to let me know if you'd liketo have either of the other two large ones for your own 'specials, ' youknow. I shan't mind changing the order a bit. Harry said you were to haveas many as you wanted. I'll hold the proofs for a day or two and let youthink it over. "

Ruth lifted her eyes to see the gaze of every woman in the room upon her, and for a moment she felt as if she almost hated poor fat doting MammaWainwright. Then the humorous side of the moment came to help her and herface blossomed into a smile as she jauntily replied:

"Oh, no, please don't bother, Mrs. Wainwright. I'm not going to paper thewall with them. I have other friends, you know. I think your choice wasthe best of them all. "

Then as gaily as if she were not raging within her soul she turned tohelp poor Dottie Wetherill who was hopelessly muddled about turning herheel. 

Dottie chattered on above the turmoil of her soul, and her words were astiny April showers sizzling on a red hot cannon. By and by she picked upDottie's dropped stitches. After all, what did such things matter whenthere was _war_ and men were giving their _lives_!

"And Bob says he doubts if they ever get to France. He says he thinks thewar will be over before half the men get trained. He says, for his part, he'd like the trip over after the submarines have been put out ofbusiness. It would be something to tell about, don't you know? But Bobthinks the war will be over soon. Don't you think so, Ruth?"

"I don't know what I think, " said Ruth exasperated at the littleprattler. It seemed so awful for a girl with brains--or hadn't shebrains?--to chatter on interminably in that inane fashion about a matterof such awful portent. And yet perhaps the child was only trying to coverup her fears, for she all too evidently worshipped her brother. 

Ruth was glad when at last the morning was over and one by one the womengathered their belongings together and went home. She stayed longer thanthe rest to put the work in order. When they were all gone she drovearound by the way of the post office and asked the old post master whohad been there for twenty years and knew everybody, if he could tell herthe address of the boys who had gone to camp that morning. He wrote itdown and she tucked it in her blouse saying she thought the Red Crosswould be sending them something soon. Then she drove thoughtfully away toher beautiful sheltered home, where the thought of war hardly dared toenter yet in any but a playful form. But somehow everything was changedwithin the heart of Ruth Macdonald and she looked about on all thefamiliar places with new eyes. What right had she to be living here inall this luxury while over there men were dying every day that she mightlive?

IV

The sun shone blindly over the broad dusty drill-field. The men marchedand wheeled, about-faced and counter-marched in their new olive-drabuniforms and thought of home--those that had any homes to think about. Some who did not thought of a home that might have been if this war hadnot happened. 

There were times when their souls could rise to the great occasion andtheir enthusiasm against the foe could carry them to all lengths ofjoyful sacrifice, but this was not one of the times. It was a breathlessIndian summer morning, and the dust was inches thick. It rose like a softyellow mist over the mushroom city of forty thousand men, brought intobeing at the command of a Nation's leader. Dust lay like a fine yellowpowder over everything. An approaching company looked like a cloud as itdrew near. One could scarcely see the men near by for the cloud of yellowdust everywhere. 

The water was bad this morning when every man was thirsty. It had beenboiled for safety and was served warm and tasted of disinfectants. Thebreakfast had been oatmeal and salty bacon swimming in congealed grease. The "boy" in the soldier's body was very low indeed that morning. The"man" with his disillusioned eyes had come to the front. Of course thiswas nothing like the hardships they would have to endure later, but itwas enough for the present to their unaccustomed minds, and harderbecause they were doing nothing that seemed worth while--just marchingabout and doing sordid duties when they were all eager for the fray andto have it over with. They had begun to see that they were going to haveto learn to wait and be patient, to obey blindly; they--who never hadbrooked commands from any one, most of them, not even from their ownparents. They had been free as air, and they had never been tied down tocertain company. Here they were all mixed up, college men and foreignlaborers, rich and poor, cultured and coarse, clean and defiled, and itwent pretty hard with them all. They had come, a bundle of prejudices andwills, and they had first to learn that every prejudice they had beenborn with or cultivated, must be given up or laid aside. They were nottheir own. They belonged to a great machine. The great perfect conceptionof the army as a whole had not yet dawned upon them. They were occupiedwith unpleasant details in the first experimental stages. At first thediscomforts seemed to rise and obliterate even the great object for whichthey had come, and discontent sat upon their faces. 

Off beyond the drill-field whichever way they looked, there were barracksthe color of the dust, and long stark roads, new and rough, the color ofthe barracks, with jitneys and trucks and men like ants crawlingfuriously back and forth upon them all animated by the same greatnecessity that had brought the men here. Even the sky seemed yellow likethe dust. The trees were gone except at the edges of the camp, cut downto make way for more barracks, in even ranks like men. 

Out beyond the barracks mimic trenches were being dug, and puppets hungin long lines for mock enemies. There were skeleton bridges to cross, walls to scale, embankments to jump over, and all, everything, was thatawful olive-drab color till the souls of the new-made soldiers cried outwithin them for a touch of scarlet or green or blue to relieve the drearymonotony. Sweat and dust and grime, weariness, homesickness, humbledpride, these were the tales of the first days of those men gathered fromall quarters who were pioneers in the first camps. 

Corporal Cameron marched his awkward squad back and forth, through allthe various manoeuvres, again and again, giving his orders in short, sharp tones, his face set, his heart tortured with the thought of thelong months and years of this that might be before him. The world seemedmost unfriendly to him these days. Not that it had ever been over kind, yet always before his native wit and happy temperament had been able tobuoy him up and carry him through hopefully. Now, however, hope seemedgone. This war might last till he was too old to carry out any of hisdreams and pull himself out of the place where fortune had dropped him. Gradually one thought had been shaping itself clearly out of the days hehad spent in camp. This life on earth was not all of existence. Theremust be something bigger beyond. It wasn't sane and sensible to thinkthat any God would allow such waste of humanity as to let some suffer allthe way through with nothing beyond to compensate. There was a meaning tothe suffering. There must be. It must be a preparation for somethingbeyond, infinitely better and more worth while. What was it and howshould he learn the meaning of his own particular bit?

John Cameron had never thought about religion before in his life. He hadbelieved in a general way in a God, or thought he believed, and that abook called the Bible told about Him and was the authentic place to learnhow to be good. The doubts of the age had not touched him because he hadnever had any interest in them. In the ordinary course of events he mightnever have thought about them in relation to himself until he came todie--perhaps not then. In college he had been too much engrossed withother things to listen to the arguments, or to be influenced by thegeneral atmosphere of unbelief. He had been a boy whose inner thoughtswere kept under lock and key, and who had lived his heart life absolutelyalone, although his rich wit and bubbling merriment had made him ageneral favorite where pure fun among the fellows was going. He loved to"rough house" as he called it, and his boyish pranks had always been thetalk of the town, the envied of the little boys; but no one knew hisreal, serious thoughts. Not even his mother, strong and self-repressedlike himself, had known how to get down beneath the surface and communewith him. Perhaps she was afraid or shy. 

Now that he was really alone among all this mob of men of all sorts andconditions, he had retired more and more into the inner sanctuary of selfand tried to think out the meaning of life. From the chaos that reignedin his mind he presently selected a few things that he called "facts"from which to work. These were "God, Hereafter, Death. " These things hemust reckon with. He had been working on a wrong hypothesis all his life. He had been trying to live for this world as if it were the end and aimof existence, and now this war had come and this world had suddenlymelted into chaos. It appeared that he and thousands of others mustprobably give up their part in this world before they had hardly triedit, if they would set things right again for those that should comeafter. But, even if he had lived out his ordinary years in peace andsuccess, and had all that life could give him, it would not have lastedlong, seventy years or so, and what were they after they were past? No, there was something beyond or it all wouldn't have been made--thisuniverse with the carefully thought out details working harmoniously onewith another. It wouldn't have been worth while otherwise. There wouldhave been no reason for a heart life. 

There were boys and men in the army who thought otherwise. Who hadaccepted this life as being all. Among these were the ones who when theyfound they were taken in the draft and must go to camp, had spent theirlast three weeks of freedom drunk because they wanted to get all the"fun" they could out of life that was left to them. They were the men whowere plunging into all the sin they could find before they went away tofight because they felt they had but a little time to live and what didit matter? But John Cameron was not one of these. His soul would not lethim alone until he had thought it all out, and he had come thus far withthese three facts, "God, Death, A Life Hereafter. " He turned these overin his mind for days and then he changed their order, "_Death, A LifeHereafter, God_. "

Death was the grim person he was going forth to meet one of these days ormonths on the field of France or Italy, or somewhere "over there. " He wasnot to wait for Death to come and get him as had been the old order. Thiswas WAR and he was going out to challenge Death. He was convinced thatwhether Death was a servant of God or the Devil, in some way it wouldmake a difference with his own personal life hereafter, how he met Death. He was not satisfied with just meeting Death bravely, with the ardor ofpatriotism in his breast, as he heard so many about him talk in thesedays. That was well so far as it went, but it did not solve the mysteryof the future life nor make him sure how he would stand in that otherworld to which Death stood ready to escort him presently. Death might bevictor over his body, but he wanted to be sure that Death should not alsokill that something within him which he felt must live forever. He turnedit over for days and came to the conclusion that the only one who couldhelp him was God. God was the beginning of it all. If there was a God Hemust be available to help a soul in a time like this. There must be a wayto find God and get the secret of life, and so be ready to meet Deaththat Death should not conquer anything but the body. How could one findGod? Had anybody ever found Him? Did anyone really _think_ they had foundHim? These were questions that beat in upon his soul day after day as hedrilled his men and went through the long hard hours of discipline, orlay upon his straw tick at night while a hundred and fifty other menabout him slept. 

His mother's secret attempts at religion had been too feeble and toohidden in her own breast to have made much of an impression upon him. Shehad only _hoped_ her faith was founded upon a rock. She had not _known_. And so her buffeted soul had never given evidence to her son of hiddenholy refuge where he might flee with her in time of need. 

Now and then the vision of a girl blurred across his thoughtsuncertainly, like a bright moth hovering in the distance whose shadowfell across his dusty path. But it was far away and vague, and only aglance in her eyes belonged to him. She was not of his world. 

He looked up to the yellow sky through the yellow dust, and his soulcried out to find the way to God before he had to meet Death, but theheavens seemed like molten brass. Not that he was afraid of death with aphysical fear, but that his soul recoiled from being conquered by it andhe felt convinced that there was a way to meet it with a smile ofassurance if only he could find it out. He had read that people had metit that way. Was it all their imagination? The mere illusion of afanatical brain? Well, he would try to find out God. He would put himselfin the places where God ought to be, and when he saw any indication thatGod was there he would cry out until he made God hear him!

The day he came to that conclusion was Sunday and he went over to theY. M. C. A. Auditorium. They were having a Mary Pickford moving picture showthere. If he had happened to go at any time during the morning he mighthave heard some fine sermons and perhaps have found the right man to helphim, but this was evening and the men were being amused. 

He stood for a few moments and watched the pretty show. The sunlight onMary's beautiful hair, as it fell glimmering through the trees in thepicture reminded him of the red-gold lights on Ruth Macdonald's hair themorning he left home, and with a sigh he turned away and walked to theedge of camp where the woods were still standing. 

Alone he looked up to the starry sky. Amusement was not what he wantednow. He was in search of something vague and great that would satisfy, and give him a reason for being and suffering and dying perhaps. Hecalled it God because he had no other name for it. Red-gold hair might befor others but not for him. He might not take it where he would and hewould not take it where it lay easy to get. If he had been in the sameclass with some other fellows he knew he would have wasted no time onfollies. He would have gone for the very highest, finest woman. Butthere! What was the use! Besides, even if he had been--and he hadhad--every joy of life here was but a passing show and must sometime cometo an end. And at the end would be this old problem. Sometime he wouldhave had to realize it, even if war had not come and brought therevelation prematurely. What was it that he wanted? How could he find outhow to die? Where was God?

But the stars were high and cold and gave no answer, and the whisperingleaves, although they soothed him, sighed and gave no help. 

The feeling was still with him next morning when the mail wasdistributed. There would be nothing for him. His mother had written herweekly letter and it had reached him the day before. He could expectnothing for several days now. Other men were getting sheaves of letters. How friendless he seemed among them all. One had a great chocolate cakethat a girl had sent him and the others were crowding around to get abit. It was doubtful if the laughing owner got more than a bite himself. He might have been one of the group if he had chosen. They all liked himwell enough, although they knew him very little as yet, for he had keptmuch to himself. But he turned sharply away from them and went out. Somehow he was not in the mood for fun. He felt he must be growing morbidbut he could not throw it off that morning. It all seemed so hopeless, the things he had tried to do in life and the slow progress he had madeupward; and now to have it all blocked by war!

None of the other fellows ever dreamed that he was lonely, big, husky, handsome fellow that he was, with a continuous joke on his lips for thosehe had chosen as associates, with an arm of iron and a jaw that set likesteel, grim and unmistakably brave. The awkward squad as they wrathfullyobeyed his stern orders would have told you he had no heart, the way heworked them, and would not have believed that he was just plain homesickand lonesome for some one to care for him. 

He was not hungry that day when the dinner call came, and flung himselfdown under a scrub oak outside the barracks while the others rushed inwith their mess kits ready for beans or whatever was provided for them. He was glad that they were gone, glad that he might have the luxury ofbeing miserable all alone for a few minutes. He felt strangely as if hewere going to cry, and yet he didn't know what about. Perhaps he wasgoing to be sick. That would be horrible down in that half finishedhospital with hardly any equipment yet! He must brace up and put an endto such softness. It was all in the idea anyway. 

Then a great hand came down upon his shoulder with a mighty slap and heflung himself bolt upright with a frown to find his comrade whose bunkwas next to his in the barracks. He towered over Cameron polishing histin plate with a vigor. 

"What's the matter with you, you boob? There's roast beef and its good. Cooky saved a piece for you. I told him you'd come. Go in and get itquick! There's a letter for you, too, in the office. I'd have brought itonly I was afraid I would miss you. Here, take my mess kit and hurry!There's some cracker-jack pickles, too, little sweet ones! Step lively, or some one will swipe them all!"

Cameron arose, accepted his friend's dishes and sauntered into the messhall. The letter couldn't be very important. His mother had no time towrite again soon, and there was no one else. It was likely anadvertisement or a formal greeting from some of the organizations athome. They did that about fortnightly, the Red Cross, the Woman's Club, The Emergency Aid, The Fire Company. It was kind in them but he wasn'tkeen about it just then. It could wait until he got his dinner. Theydidn't have roast beef every day, and now that he thought about it he washungry. 

He almost forgot the letter after dinner until a comrade reminded him, handing over a thick delicately scented envelope with a silver crest onthe back. The boys got off their kidding about "the girl he'd left behindhim" and he answered with his old good-natured grin that made them lovehim, letting them think he had all kinds of girls, for the dinner hadsomewhat restored his spirits, but he crumpled the letter into his pocketand got away into the woods to read it. 

Deliberately he walked down the yellow road, up over the hill by thesignal corps tents, across Wig-Wag Park to the woods beyond, and sat downon a log with his letter. He told himself that it was likely one of thosefool letters the fellows were getting all the time from silly girls whowere uniform-crazy. He wouldn't answer it, of course, and he felt a kindof contempt with himself for being weak enough to read it even to satisfyhis curiosity. 

Then he tore open the envelope half angrily and a faint whiff of violetsfloated out to him. Over his head a meadow lark trilled a long sweetmeasure, and glad surprise suddenly entered into his soul. 

V

The letter was written in a fine beautiful hand and even before he sawthe silver monogram at the top, he knew who was the writer, though he didnot even remember to have seen the writing before:

MY DEAR FRIEND:

I have hesitated a long time before writing because I do not know that Ihave the right to call you a friend, or even an acquaintance in thecommonly accepted sense of that term. It is so long since you and I wentto school together, and we have been so widely separated since then thatperhaps you do not even remember me, and may consider my letter anintrusion. I hope not, for I should hate to rank with the girls who arewriting to strangers under the license of mistaken patriotism. 

My reason for writing you is that a good many years ago you did somethingvery nice and kind for me one day, in fact you helped me twice, althoughI don't suppose you knew it. Then the other day, when you were going tocamp and I sat in my car and watched you, it suddenly came over me thatyou were doing it again; this time a great big wonderful thing for me;and doing it just as quietly and inconsequentially as you did it before;and all at once I realized how splendid it was and wanted to thank you. 

It came over me, too, that I had never thanked you for the other times, and very likely you never dreamed that you had done anything at all. 

You see I was only a little girl, very much frightened, because ChuckWoodcock had teased me about my curls and said that he was going to catchme and cut them off, and send me home to my aunt that way, and she wouldturn me out of the house. He had been frightening me for several days, sothat I was afraid to go to school alone, and yet I would not tell my auntbecause I was afraid she would take me away from the Public School andsend me to a Private School which I did not want. But that day I had seenChuck Woodcock steal in behind the hedge, ahead of the girls. The otherswere ahead of me and I was all out of breath--running to catch up becauseI was afraid to pass him alone; and just as I got near two of them, --MaryWurts and Caroline Meadows, you remember them, don't you?--they gave ascream and pitched headlong on the sidewalk. They had tripped over a wirehe had stretched from the tree to the hedge. I stopped short and gotbehind a tree, and I remember how the tears felt in my throat, but I wasafraid to let them out because Chuck would call me a crybaby and I hatedthat. And just then you came along behind me and jumped through the hedgeand caught Chuck and gave him an awful whipping. "Licking" I believe wecalled it then. I remember how condemned I felt as I ran by the hedge andknew in my heart that I was glad you were hurting him because he had beenso cruel to me. He used to pull my curls whenever he sat behind me inrecitation. 

I remember you came in to school late with your hair all mussed upbeautifully, and a big tear in your coat, and a streak of mud on yourface. I was so worried lest the teacher would find out you had beenfighting and make you stay after school. Because you see I knew in myheart that you had been winning a battle for me, and if anybody had tostay after school I wished it could be me because of what you had donefor me. But you came in laughing as you always did, and looking as ifnothing in the world unusual had happened, and when you passed my deskyou threw before me the loveliest pink rose bud I ever saw. That was thesecond thing you did for me. 

Perhaps you won't understand how nice that was, either, for you see youdidn't know how unhappy I had been. The girls hadn't been very friendlywith me. They told me I was "stuck up, " and they said I was too young tobe in their classes anyway and ought to go to Kindergarten. It was allvery hard for me because I longed to be big and have them for my friends. I was very lonely in that great big house with only my aunt andgrandfather for company. But the girls wouldn't be friends at all untilthey saw you give me that rose, and that turned the tide. They were crazyabout you, every one of them, and, they made up to me after that and toldme their secrets and shared their lunch and we had great times. And itwas all because you gave me the rose that day. The rose itself was lovelyand I was tremendously happy over it for its own sake, but it meant awhole lot to me besides, and opened the little world of school to mylonging feet. I always wanted to thank you for it, but you looked as ifyou didn't want me to, so I never dared; and lately I wasn't quite sureyou knew me, because you never looked my way any more. 

But when I saw you standing on the platform the other day with the otherdrafted men, it all came over me how you were giving up the life you hadplanned to go out and fight for me and other girls like me. I hadn'tthought of the war that way before, although, of course, I had heard thatthought expressed in speeches; but it never struck into my heart until Isaw the look on your face. It was a kind of "knightliness, " if there issuch a word, and when I thought about it I realized it was the very samelook you had worn when you burst through the hedge after Chuck Woodcock, and again when you came back and threw that rose on my desk. Although, you had a big, broad boy's-grin on your face then, and were chewing gum Iremember quite distinctly; and the other day you looked so serious andsorry as if it meant a great deal to you to go, but you were giving upeverything gladly without even thinking of hesitating. The look on yourface was a man's look, not a boy's. 

It has meant so much to me to realize this last great thing that you aredoing for me and for the other girls of our country that I had to writeand tell you how much I appreciate it. 

I have been wondering whether some one has been knitting you a sweateryet, and the other things that they knit for soldiers; and if theyhaven't, whether you would let me send them to you? It is the only thingI can do for you who have done so much for me. 

I hope you will not think I am presuming to have written this on thestrength of a childish acquaintance. I wish you all honors that can cometo you on such a quest as yours, and I had almost said all good luck, only that that word sounds too frivolous and pagan for such a seriousmatter; so I will say all safety for a swift accomplishment of your taskand a swift homecoming. I used to think when I was a little child thatnothing could ever hurt you or make you afraid, and I cannot help feelingnow that you will come through the fire unscathed. May I hope to hearfrom you about the sweater and things? And may I sign myself

 Your friend?

 RUTH MACDONALD. 

John Cameron lifted his eyes from the paper at last and looked up at thesky. Had it ever been so blue before? At the trees. What whisperingwonders of living green! Was that only a bird that was singing thatheavenly song--a meadow lark, not an angel? Why had he never appreciatedmeadow larks before?

He rested his head back against a big oak and his soldier's hat fell offon the ground. He closed his eyes and the burden of loneliness that hadborne down upon him all these weeks in the camp lifted from his heart. Then he tried to realize what had come to him. Ruth Macdonald, the wonderand admiration of his childhood days, the admired and envied of the hometown, the petted beauty at whose feet every man fell, the girl who hadeverything that wealth could purchase! She had remembered the little oldrose he had dared to throw on her desk, and had bridged the years withthis letter!

He was carried back in spirit to the day he left for camp. To the look inher eyes as he moved away on the train. The look had been real then, andnot just a fleeting glance helped out by his fevered imagination. Therehad been true friendliness in her eyes. She had intended to say good-byeto him! She had put him on a level with her own beautiful self. She hadknighted him, as it were, and sent him forth! Even the war had becomedifferent since she chose to think he was going forth to fight herbattles. What a sacred trust!

Afar in the distance a bugle sounded that called to duty. He had no ideahow the time had flown. He glanced at his wrist watch and was amazed. Hesprang to his feet and strode over the ground, but the way no longerseemed dusty and blinded with sunshine. It shone like a path of glorybefore his willing feet, and he went to his afternoon round of dutieslike a new man. He had a friend, a real friend, one that he had known along time. There was no fear that she was just writing to him to get onemore soldier at her feet as some girls would have done. Her letter wastoo frank and sincere to leave a single doubt about what she meant. Hewould take her at her word. 

Sometime during the course of the afternoon it occurred to him to look atthe date of the letter, and he found to his dismay that it had beenwritten nearly four weeks before and had been travelling around throughvarious departments in search of him, because it had not the correctaddress. He readily guessed that she had not wanted to ask for hiscompany and barracks; she would not have known who to ask. She did notknow his mother, and who else was there? His old companions were mostlygone to France or camp somewhere. 

And now, since all this time had elapsed she would think he had notcared, had scorned her letter or thought it unmaidenly! He was filledwith dismay and anxiety lest he had hurt her frankness by his seemingindifference. And the knitted things, the wonderful things that she hadmade with her fair hands! Would she have given them to some one else bythis time? Of course, it meant little to her save as a kind ofacknowledgment for something she thought he had done for her as a child, but they meant so much to him! Much more than they ought to do, he knew, for he was in no position to allow himself to become deeply attached toeven the handiwork of any girl in her position. However, nobody need everknow how much he cared, had always cared, for the lovely little girl withher blue eyes, her long curls, her shy sweet smile and modest ways, whohad seemed to him like an angel from heaven when he was a boy. She hadsaid he did not know that he was helping her when he burst through thehedge on the cowering Chuck Woodcock; and he would likely never dare totell her that it was because he saw her fright and saw her hide behindthat tree that he went to investigate and so was able to administer ajust punishment. He had picked that rose from the extreme west corner ofa great petted rose bush on the Wainwright lawn, reaching through anelaborate iron fence to get it as he went cross-lots back to school. Hewould call it stealing now to do that same, but then it had been in thenature of a holy rite offered to a vestal virgin. Yet he must have castit down with the grin of an imp, boorish urchin that he was; and heremembered blushing hotly in the dark afterwards at his presumption, ashe thought of it alone at night. And all the time she had been liking it. The little girl--the little sweet girl! She had kept it in her heart andremembered it!

His heart was light as air as he went back to the barracks for retreat. Amiracle had been wrought for him which changed everything. No, he was notpresuming on a friendly letter. Maybe there would be fellows who wouldthink there wasn't much in just a friendly letter to a lonely soldier, and a sweater or two more or less. But then they would never have knownwhat it was to be so lonely for friendship, real friendship, as he was. 

He would hurry through supper and get to the Y. M. C. A. Hut to write her ananswer. He would explain how the letter had been delayed and say he hopedshe had not given the things away to someone else. He began planningsentences as he stood at attention during the captain's inspection atretreat. Somehow the captain was tiresomely particular about the buttonsand pocket flaps and little details to-night. He waited impatiently forthe command to break ranks, and was one of the first at the door of themess hall waiting for supper, his face alight, still planning what hewould say in that letter and wishing he could get some fine stationery towrite upon; wondering if there was any to be had with his caduces on it. 

At supper he bubbled with merriment. An old schoolmate might have thoughthim rejuvenated. He wore his schoolboy grin and rattled off puns andjokes, keeping the mess hall in a perfect roar. 

At last he was out in the cool of the evening with the wonderful sunsetoff in the west, on his way to the Y. M. C. A. Hut. He turned a cornerswinging into the main road and there, coming toward him, not twenty feetaway, he saw Lieutenant Wainwright!

VI

There was no possible way to avoid meeting him. John Cameron knew thatwith the first glance. He also knew that Wainwright had recognized him atonce and was lifting his chin already with that peculiar, disagreeabletilt of triumph that had always been so maddening to one who knew thesmall mean nature of the man. 

Of course, there was still time to turn deliberately about and flee inthe other direction, but that would be all too obvious, and an openconfession of weakness. John Cameron was never at any time a coward. 

His firm lips set a trifle more sternly than usual, his handsome head washeld high with fine military bearing. He came forward without falteringfor even so much as the fraction of a waver. There was not a flicker inhis eyes set straight ahead. One would never have known from his looksthat he recognized the oncoming man, or had so much as realized that anofficer was approaching, yet his brain was doing some rapid calculation. He had said in his heart if not openly that he would never salute thisman. He had many times in their home town openly passed him withoutsalute because he had absolutely no respect for him, and felt that heowed it to his sense of the fitness of things not to give him deference, but that was a different matter from camp. He knew that Wainwright was ina position to do him injury, and no longer stood in fear of a goodthrashing from him as at home, because here he could easily have theoffender put in the guard house and disgraced forever. Nothing, ofcourse, would delight him more than thus to humiliate his sworn enemy. Yet Cameron walked on knowing that he had resolved not to salute him. 

It was not merely pride in his own superiority. It was contempt for thenature of the man, for his low contemptible plots and tricks, and cunningways, for his entire lack of principle, and his utter selfishness andheartlessness, that made Cameron feel justified in his attitude towardWainwright. "He is nothing but a Hun at heart, " he told himself bitterly. 

But the tables were turned. Wainwright was no longer in his home townwhere his detestable pranks had goaded many of his neighbors andfellowtownsmen into a cordial hatred of him. He was in a great militarycamp, vested with a certain amount of authority, with the right to reportthose under him; who in turn could not retaliate by telling what theyknew of him because it was a court-martial offense for a private toreport an officer. Well, naturally the United States was not supposed tohave put men in authority who needed reporting. Cameron, of course, realized that these things had to be in order to maintain militarydiscipline. But it was inevitable that some unworthy ones should creepin, and Wainwright was surely one of those unworthy ones. He would notbend to him, officer, or no officer. What did he care what happened tohimself? Who was there to care but his mother? And she would understandif the news should happen to penetrate to the home town, which was hardlylikely. Those who knew him would not doubt him, those who did notmattered little. There was really no one who would care. Stay! A lettercrackled in his breast pocket and a cold chill of horror struggled upfrom his heart. Suppose _she_ should hear of it! Yes, he would care forthat!

They were almost meeting now and Cameron's eyes were straight aheadstaring hard at the big green shape of the theatre a quarter of a mileaway. His face under its usual control showed no sign of the tumult inhis heart, which flamed with a sudden despair against a fate that hadplaced him in such a desperate situation. If there were a just power whocontrolled the affairs of men, how could it let such things happen to onewho had always tried to live up upright life? It seemed for that instantas if all the unfairness and injustice of his own hard life hadculminated in that one moment when he would have to do or not do and bearthe consequences. 

Then suddenly out from the barracks close at hand with brisk step andnoble bearing came Captain La Rue, swinging down the walk into the roadstraight between the two men and stopped short in front of Cameron with alight of real welcome in his eyes, as he lifted his hand to answer thesalute which the relieved Cameron instantly flashed at him. 

In that second Lieutenant Wainwright flung past them with a curt saluteto the higher officer and a glare at the corporal which the latter seemednot to see. It was so simultaneous with Cameron's salute of La Rue thatnobody on earth could say that the salute had not included thelieutenant, yet both the lieutenant and the corporal knew that it hadnot; and Wainwright's brow was dark with intention as he turned sharplyup the walk to the barracks which the captain had just left. 

"I was just coming in search of you, Cameron, " said the captain with atwinkle in his eyes, and his voice was clearly distinct to Wainwright ashe loitered in the barracks doorway to listen, "I went down to Washingtonyesterday and put in the strongest plea I knew how for your transfer. Ihope it will go through all right. There is no one else out for the joband you are just the man for the place. It will be a great comfort tohave you with me. "

A few more words and the busy man moved on eluding Cameron's earnestthanks and leaving him to pursue his course to the Y. M. C. A. Hut with asense of soothing and comfort. It never occurred to either of them thattheir brief conversation had been overheard, and would not have disturbedthem if it had. 

Lieutenant Wainwright lingered on the steps of the barracks with agrowing curiosity and satisfaction. The enemy were playing right into hishands: _both_ the enemy--for he hated Captain La Rue as sin always hatesthe light. 

He lounged about the barracks in deep thought for a few minutes and thenmade a careful toilet and went out. 

He knew exactly where to go and how to use his influence, which was notsmall, although not personal. It was characteristic of the man that itmade no difference to him that the power he was wielding was a borrowedpower whose owner would have been the last man to have done what he wasabout to do with it. He had never in his life hesitated about gettingwhatever he wanted by whatever means presented itself. He was often awarethat people gave him what he wanted merely to get rid of him, but thisdid not alloy his pleasure in his achievement. 

He was something of a privileged character in the high place to which hebetook himself, on account of the supreme regard which was held for theuncle, a mighty automobile king, through whose influence he had obtainedhis commission. So far he had not availed himself of his privileges toooften and had therefore not as yet outworn his welcome, for he was a truediplomat. He entered this evening with just the right shade of delicateassurance and humble affrontery to assure him a cordial welcome, andgracefully settled himself into the friendliness that was readilyextended to him. He was versed in all the ways of the world and when hechose could put up a good appearance. He knew that for the sake of hisfather's family and more especially because of his uncle's high standing, this great official whom he was calling upon was bound to be nice to himfor a time. So he bided his time till a few other officials had left andhis turn came. 

The talk was all personal, a few words about his relatives and thenquestions about himself, his commission, how he liked it, and how thingswere going with him. Mere form and courtesy, but he knew how to use theconversation for his own ends:

"Oh, I'm getting along fine and dandy!" he declared effusively, "I'm justcrazy about camp! I like the life! But I'll tell you what makes me tired. It's these little common guys running around fussing about their jobs andtrying to get a lot of pull to get into some other place. Now there's aninstance of that in our company, a man from my home town, no accountwhatever and never was, but he's got it in his head that he's a squarepeg in a round hole and he wants to be transferred. He shouts about itfrom morning till night trying to get everybody to help him, and at lastI understand he's hoodwinked one captain into thinking he's the salt ofthe earth, and they are plotting together to get him transferred. Ihappened to overhear them talking about it just now, how they are goingto this one and that one in Washington to get things fixed to suit them. They think they've got the right dope on things all right and it's goingthrough for him to get his transfer. It makes me sick. He's no more fitfor a commission than my dog, not as fit, for he could at least obeyorders. This fellow never did anything but what he pleased. I've knownhim since we were kids and never liked him. But he has a way with himthat gets people till they understand him. It's too bad when the countryneeds real men to do their duty that a fellow like that can get acommission when he is utterly inefficient besides being a regular breederof trouble. But, of course, I can't tell anybody what I know about him. "

"I guess you needn't worry, Wainwright. They can't make any transferswithout sending them up to me, and you may be good and sure I'm nottransferring anybody just now without a good reason, no matter who isasking it. He's in your company, is he? And where does he ask to betransferred? Just give me his name. I'll make a note of it. If it evercomes up I'll know how to finish him pretty suddenly. Though I doubt ifit does. People are not pulling wires just now. This is _war_ andeverything means business. However, if I find there has been wire-pullingI shall know how to deal with it summarily. It's a court-martial offense, you know. "

They passed on to other topics, and Wainwright with his little eyesgleaming triumphantly soon took himself out into the starlight knowingthat he had done fifteen minutes' good work and not wishing to outdo it. He strolled contentedly back to officers' quarters wearing a morecomplacent look on his heavy features. He would teach John Cameron toignore him!

Meantime John Cameron with his head among the stars walked the dusty campstreets and forgot the existence of Lieutenant Wainwright. A glow ofgratitude had flooded his soul at sight of his beloved captain, whom hehoped soon to be able to call _his_ captain. Unconsciously he walked withmore self-respect as the words of confidence and trust rang over again inhis ears. Unconsciously the little matters of personal enmity becamesmaller, of less importance, beside the greater things of life in whichhe hoped soon to have a real part. If he got this transfer it meant achance to work with a great man in a great way that would not only helpthe war but would be of great value to him in this world after the warwas over. It was good to have the friendship of a man like that, fine, clean, strong, intellectual, kind, just, human, gentle as a woman, yetstern against all who deviated from the path of right. 

The dusk was settling into evening and twinkling lights gloomed out amidthe misty, dust-laden air. Snatches of wild song chorused out from openwindows:

 She's my lady, my baby, She's cock-eyed, she's crazy. 

The twang of a banjo trailed in above the voices, with a sound ofscuffling. Loud laughter broke the thread of the song leaving _"MaryAnn!"_ to soar out alone. Then the chorus took it up once more:

 All her teeth are false From eating Rochelle salts-- She's my freckled-faced, consumptive MARY ANN-N-N!

Cameron turned in at the quiet haven of the Y. M. C. A. Hut, glad to leavethe babel sounds outside. Somehow they did not fit his mood to-night, although there were times when he could roar the outlandish gibberishwith the best of them. But to-night he was on such a wonderful sacrederrand bent, that it seemed as though he wanted to keep his soul fromcontact with rougher things lest somehow it might get out of tune and sounfit him for the task before him. 

And then when he had seated himself before the simple desk he looked atthe paper with discontent. True, it was all that was provided and it wasgood enough for ordinary letters, but this letter to her was different. He wished he had something better. To think he was really writing to_her_! And now that he was here with the paper before him what was he tosay? Words seemed to have deserted him. How should he address her?

It was not until he had edged over to the end of the bench away fromeverybody else and taken out the precious letter that he gainedconfidence and took up his pen:

"My dear friend:----" Why, he would call her his friend, of course, thatwas what she had called him. And as he wrote he seemed to see her againas she sat in her car by the station the day he started on his long, longtrail and their eyes had met. Looking so into her eyes again, he wrotestraight from his soul:

MY DEAR FRIEND:

Your letter has just reached me after travelling about for weeks. I amnot going to try to tell you how wonderful it is to me to have it. Infact, the wonder began that morning I left home when you smiled at me andwaved a friendly farewell. It was a great surprise to me. I had notsupposed until that moment that you remembered my existence. Why shouldyou? And it has never been from lack of desire to do so that I failed togreet you when we passed in the street. I did not think that I, a merelittle hoodlum from your infant days, had a right to intrude upon yourgrown-up acquaintance without a hint from you that such recognition wouldbe agreeable. I never blamed you for not speaking of course. Perhaps Ididn't give you the chance. I simply thought I had grown out of yourmemory as was altogether natural. It was indeed a pleasant experience tosee that light of friendliness in your eyes at the station that day, andto know it was a real personal recognition and not just a patriotic gushof enthusiasm for the whole shabby lot of us draftees starting out to anunknown future. I thanked you in my heart for that little bit of personalfriendliness but I never expected to have an opportunity to thank you inwords, nor to have the friendliness last after I had gone away. When yourletter came this morning it sure was some pleasant surprise. I know youhave a great many friends, and plenty of people to write letters to, butsomehow there was a real note of comradeship in the one you wrote me, notas if you just felt sorry for me because I had to go off to war and fightand maybe get killed. It was as if the conditions of the times hadsuddenly swept away a lot of foolish conventions of the world, which mayall have their good use perhaps at times, but at a time like this aresuperfluous, and you had just gravely and sweetly offered me an oldfriend's sympathy and good will. As such I have taken it and am rejoicingin it. 

Don't make any mistake about this, however. I never have forgotten you orthe rose! I stole it from the Wainwright's yard after I got done lickingChuck, and I had a fight with Hal Wainwright over it which almostfinished the rose, and nearly got me expelled from school before I gotthrough with it. Hal told his mother and she took it to the school board. I was a pretty tough little rascal in those days I guess and no doubtneeded some lickings myself occasionally. But I remember I almost lost mynerve when I got back to school that day and came within an ace ofstuffing the rose in my pocket instead of throwing it on your desk. Inever dreamed the rose would be anything to you. It was only my way ofpaying tribute to you. You seemed to me something like a rose yourself, just dropped down out of heaven you know, you were so little and pink andgold with such great blue eyes. Pardon me. I don't mean to be toopersonal. You don't mind a big hobbledehoy's admiration, do you? You wereonly a baby; but I would have licked any boy in town that lifted a wordor a finger against you. And to think you really needed my help! Itcertainly would have lifted me above the clouds to have known it then!

And now about this war business. Of course it is a rough job, andsomebody had to do it for the world. I was glad and willing to do mypart; but it makes a different thing out of it to be called a knight, andI guess I'll look at it a little more respectfully now. If a life likemine can protect a life like yours from some of the things those Germansare putting over I'll gladly give it. I've sized it up that a mancouldn't do a bigger thing for the world anyhow he planned it than tomake the world safe for a life like yours; so me for what they call "thesupreme sacrifice, " and it won't be any sacrifice at all if it helps you!

No, I haven't got a sweater or those other things that go with those thatyou talk about. Mother hasn't time to knit and I never was much of alady's man, I guess you know if you know me at all. Or perhaps you don't. But anyhow I'd be wonderfully pleased to wear a sweater that you knit, although it seems a pretty big thing for you to do for me. However, ifknitting is your job in this war, and I wouldn't be robbing any otherbetter fellow, I certainly would just love to have it. 

If you could see this big dusty monotonous olive-drab camp you would knowwhat a bright spot your letter and the thought of a real friend has madein it. I suppose you have been thinking all this time that I wasneglectful because I didn't answer, but it was all the fault of someonewho gave you the wrong address. I am hoping you will forgive me for thedelay and that some day you will have time to write to me again. 

 Sincerely and proudly, Your knight, JOHN CAMERON. 

As he walked back to his barracks in the starlight his heart was filledwith a great peace. What a thing it was to have been able to speak to heron paper and let her know his thoughts of her. It was as if after allthese years he had been able to pluck another trifling rose and lay it ather lovely feet. Her knight! It was the fulfillment of all his boyishdreams!

He had entrusted his letter to the Y. M. C. A. Man to mail as he was goingout of camp that night and would mail it in Baltimore, ensuring it animmediate start. Now he began to speculate whether it would reach itsdestination by morning and be delivered with the morning mail. He felt asexcited and impatient as a child over it. 

Suddenly a voice above him in a barracks window rang out with a familiarguffaw, and the words:

"Why, man, I can't! Didn't I tell you I'm going to marry Ruth Macdonaldbefore I go! There wouldn't be time for that and the other, too!"

Something in his heart grew cold with pain and horror, and something inhis motive power stopped suddenly and halted his feet on the sidewalk inthe grade cut below the officers' barracks. 

"Aw! A week more won't make any difference, " drawled another familiarvoice, "I say, Hal, she's just crazy about you and you could get no endof information out of her if you tried. All she asks is that you tellwhat you know about a few little things that don't matter anyway. "

"But I tell you I can't, man. If Ruth found out about the girl themischief would be to pay. She wouldn't stand for another girl--not thatkind of a girl, you know, and there wouldn't be time for me to explainand smooth things over before I go across the Pond. I tell you I've madeup my mind about this. "

The barracks door slammed shut on the voices and Corporal Cameron's heartgave a great jump upwards in his breast and went on. Slowly, dizzily hecame to his senses and moved on automatically toward his own quarters. 

VII

He had passed the quarters of the signal corps before the thought of theletter he had just written came to his mind. Then he stopped short, gaveone agonizing glance toward his barracks only a few feet away, realizedthat it was nearly time for bed call and that he could not possibly makeit if he went back, then whirled about and started out on a wild run likea madman over the ground he had just traveled. He was not conscious ofcarrying on a train of thought as he ran, his only idea was to get to theY. M. C. A. Hut before the man had left with the letter. Never should hischildhood's enemy have that letter to sneer over!

All the pleasant phrases which had flowed from his pen so easily but afew moments before seemed to flare now in letters of fire before hisblood-shot eyes as he bounded over the ground. To think he should havelowered himself and weakened his position so, as to write to the girl whowas soon to be the wife of that contemptible puppy!

The bugles began to sound taps here and there in the barracks as he flewpast, but they meant nothing to him. Breathless he arrived at theY. M. C. A. Hut just as the last light was being put out. A dark figurestood on the steps as he halted entirely winded, and tried to gasp out:"Where is Mr. Hathaway?" to the assistant who was locking up. 

"Oh, he left five minutes after you did, " said the man with a yawn. "Therector came by in his car and took him along. Say, you'll be late gettingin, Corporal, taps sounded almost five minutes ago. "

With a low exclamation of disgust and dismay Cameron turned and startedback again in a long swinging stride, his face flushing hotly in the darkover his double predicament. He had gone back for nothing and got himselfsubject to a calling down, a thing which he had avoided scrupulouslysince coming to camp, but he was so miserable over the other matter thatit seemed a thing of no moment to him now. He was altogether occupiedwith metaphorically kicking himself for having answered that letter; forhaving mailed it so soon without ever stopping to read it over or givehimself a chance to reconsider. He might have known, he might haveremembered that Ruth Macdonald was no comrade for him; that she was aneighbor of the Wainwright's and would in all probability be a friend ofthe lieutenant's. Not for all that he owned in the world or hoped to own, would he have thus laid himself open to the possibility of havingWainwright know any of his inner thoughts. He would rather have lived anddied unknown, unfriended, than that this should come to pass. 

And she? The promised wife of Wainwright! Could it be? She must havewritten him that letter merely from a fine friendly patronage. All right, of course, from her standpoint, but from his, gall and wormwood to hisproud spirit. Oh, that he had not answered it! He might have known! Heshould have remembered that she had never been in his class. Not that hispeople were not as good as hers, and maybe better, so far as intellectualattainments were concerned; but his had lost their money, had lived aquiet life, and in her eyes and the eyes of her family were very likelyas the mere dust of the earth. And now, just now when war had set itsseal of sacrifice upon all young men in uniform, he as a soldier hadrisen to a kind of deified class set apart for hero worship, nothingmore. It was not her fault that she had been brought up that way, andthat he seemed so to her, and nothing more. She had shown her beautifulspirit in giving him the tribute that seemed worthiest to her view. Hewould not blame her, nor despise her, but he would hold himself aloof ashe had done in the past, and show her that he wanted no favors, nopatronage. He was sufficient to himself. What galled him most was tothink that perhaps in the intimacy of their engagement she might show hisletter to Wainwright, and they would laugh together over him, a poorsoldier, presuming to write as he had done to a girl in her station. Theywould laugh together, half pitifully--at least the woman would bepitiful, the man was likely to sneer. He could see his hateful mustachecurl now with scorn and his little eyes twinkle. And he would tell herall the lies he had tried to put upon him in the past. He would give hera wrong idea of his character. He would rejoice and triumph to do so! Oh, the bitterness of it! It overwhelmed him so that the little matter ofgetting into his bunk without being seen by the officer in charge wasutterly overlooked by him. 

Perhaps some good angel arranged the way for him so that he was able toslip past the guards without being challenged. Two of the guards weretalking at the corner of the barracks with their backs to him at theparticular second when he came in sight. A minute later they turned backto their monotonous march and the shadow of the vanishing corporal hadjust disappeared from among the other dark shadows of the nightlandscape. Inside the barracks another guard welcomed him eagerly withoutquestioning his presence there at that hour:

"Say, Cam, how about day after to-morrow? Are you free? Will you take myplace on guard? I want to go up to Philadelphia and see my girl, and I'msure of a pass, but I'm listed for guard duty. I'll do the same for yousometime. "

"Sure!" said Cameron heartily, and swung up stairs with a suddenrealization that he had been granted a streak of good luck. Yet somehowhe did not seem to care much. 

He tiptoed over to his bunk among the rows of sleeping forms, removedfrom it a pair of shoes, three books, some newspapers and a mess kitwhich some lazy comrades had left there, and threw himself down withscant undressing. It seemed as though a great calamity had befallen him, although when he tried to reason it out he could not understand howthings were so much changed from what they had been that morning beforehe received the letter. Ruth Macdonald had never been anything in hislife but a lovely picture. There was no slightest possibility that shewould ever be more. She was like a distant star to be admired but nevercome near. Had he been fool enough to have his head turned by her writingthat kind letter to him? Had he even remotely fancied she would ever beanything nearer to him than just a formal friend who occasionally stoopedto give a bright smile or do a kindness? Well, if he had, he needed thisknockdown blow. It might be a good thing that it came so soon before hehad let this thing grow in his imagination; but oh, if it had but come abit sooner! If it had only been on the way over to the Y. M. C. A. Hutinstead of on the way back that letter would never have been written! Shewould have set him down as a boor perhaps, but what matter? What was sheto him, or he to her? Well--perhaps he would have written a letterbriefly to thank her for her offer of knitting, but it would have been anentirely different letter from the one he did write. He ground his teethas he thought out the letter he should have written:

MY DEAR MISS MACDONALD: (No "friend" about that. )

It certainly was kind of you to think of me as a possible recipient of asweater. But I feel that there are other boys who perhaps need thingsmore than I do. I am well supplied with all necessities. I appreciateyour interest in an old school friend. The life of a soldier is not sobad, and I imagine we shall have no end of novel experiences before thewar is over. I hope we shall be able to put an end to this terriblestruggle very soon when we get over and make the world a safe and happyplace for you and your friends. Here's hoping the men who are yourspecial friends will all come home safe and sound and soon. 

 Sincerely, J. CAMERON. 

He wrote that letter over and over mentally as he tossed on his bunk inthe dark, changing phrases and whole sentences. Perhaps it would bebetter to say something about "her officer friends" and make it veryclear to her that he understood his own distant position with her. Thensuddenly he kicked the big blue blanket off and sat up with a deep sigh. What a fool he was. He could not write another letter. The letter wasgone, and as it was written he must abide by it. He could not get it backor unwrite it much as he wished it. There was no excuse, or way to makeit possible to write and refuse those sweaters and things, was there?

He sat staring into the darkness while the man in the next bunk roused totoss back his blanket which had fallen superfluously across his face, andto mutter some sleepy imprecations. But Cameron was off on thecomposition of another letter:

MY DEAR MISS MACDONALD:

I have been thinking it over and have decided that I do not need asweater or any of those other things you mention. I really am pretty wellsupplied with necessities, and you know they don't give us much room toput anything around the barracks. There must be a lot of other fellowswho need them more, so I will decline that you may give your work toothers who have nothing, or to those who are your personal friends. 

 Very truly, J. CAMERON. 

Having convinced his turbulent brain that it was quite possible for himto write such a letter as this, he flung himself miserably back on hishard cot again and realized that he did not want to write it. That itwould be almost an insult to the girl, who even if she had beenpatronizing him, had done it with a kind intent, and after all it was nother fault that he was a fool. She had a right to marry whom she would. Certainly he never expected her to marry him. Only he had to own tohimself that he wanted those things she had offered. He wanted to touchsomething she had worked upon, and feel that it belonged to him. Hewanted to keep this much of human friendship for himself. Even if she wasgoing to marry another man, she had always been his ideal of a beautiful, lovable woman, and as such she should stay his, even if she married adozen enemy officers!

It was then he began to see that the thing that was really making himmiserable was that she was giving her sweet young life to such a rottenlittle mean-natured man as Wainwright. That was the real pain. If somefine noble man like--well--like Captain La Rue, only younger, of course, should come along he would be glad for her. But this excuse for a man!Oh, it was outrageous! How could she be so deceived? and yet, of course, women knew very little of men. They had no standards by which to judgethem. They had no opportunity to see them except in plain sight of thosethey wished to please. One could not expect them to have discernment inselecting their friends. But what a pity! Things were all wrong! Thereought to be some way to educate a woman so that she would realize thedangers all about her and be somewhat protected. It was worse for RuthMacdonald because she had no men in her family who could protect her. Herold grandfather was the only near living male relative and he was ahopeless invalid, almost entirely confined to the house. What could heknow of the young men who came to court his granddaughter? What did heremember of the ways of men, having been so many years shut away fromtheir haunts?

The corporal tossed on his hard cot and sighed like a furnace. Thereought to be some one to protect her. Someone ought to make her understandwhat kind of a fellow Wainwright was! She had called him her knight, anda knight's business was to protect, yet what could he do? He could not goto her and tell her that the man she was going to marry was rotten andutterly without moral principle. He could not even send some one else towarn her. Who could he send? His mother? No, his mother would feel shyand afraid of a girl like that. She had always lived a quiet life. Hedoubted if she would understand herself how utterly unfit a mateWainwright was for a good pure girl. And there was no one else in theworld that he could send. Besides, if she loved the man, andincomprehensible as it seemed, she must love him or why should she marryhim?--if she loved him she would not believe an angel from heaven againsthim. Women were that way; that is, if they were good women, like Ruth. Oh, to think of her tied up to that--_beast!_ He could think of no otherword. In his agony he rolled on his face and groaned aloud. 

"Oh God!" his soul cried out, "why do such things have to be? If therereally is a God why does He let such awful things happen to a pure goodgirl? The same old bitter question that had troubled the hard young daysof his own life. Could there be a God who cared when bitterness was in somany cups? Why had God let the war come?"

Sometime in the night the tumult in his brain and heart subsided and hefell into a profound sleep. The next thing he knew the kindly roughnessof his comrades wakened him with shakes and wet sponges flying throughthe air, and he opened his consciousness to the world again and heard thebugle blowing for roll call. Another day had dawned grayly and he mustget up. They set him on his feet, and bantered him into action, and heresponded with his usual wit that put them all in howls of laughter, butas he stumbled into place in the line in the five o'clock dawning herealized that a heavy weight was on his heart which he tried to throwoff. What did it matter what Ruth Macdonald did with her life? She wasnothing to him, never had been and never could be. If only he had notwritten that letter all would now be as it always had been. If only shehad not written her letter! Or no! He put his hand to his breast pocketwith a quick movement of protection. Somehow he was not yet ready torelinquish that one taste of bright girl friendliness, even though it hadbrought a stab in its wake. 

He was glad when the orders came for him and five other fellows to trampacross the camp to the gas school and go through two solid hours ofinstruction ending with a practical illustration of the gas mask and agood dose of gas. It helped to put his mind on the great business of warwhich was to be his only business now until it or he were ended. He sethis lips grimly and went about his work vigorously. What did it matter, anyway, what she thought of him? He need never answer another letter, even if she wrote. He need not accept the package from the post office. He could let them send it back--refuse it and let them send it back, thatwas what he could do! Then she might think what she liked. Perhaps shewould suppose him already gone to France. Anyhow, he would forget her! Itwas the only sensible thing to do. 

Meanwhile the letter had flown on its way with more than ordinaryswiftness, as if it had known that a force was seeking to bring it backagain. The Y. M. C. A. Man was carried at high speed in an automobile to thenearest station to the camp, and arrived in time to catch the Baltimoretrain just stopping. In the Baltimore station he went to mail the letterjust as the letter gatherer arrived with his keys to open the box. So theletter lost no time but was sorted and started northward before midnight, and by some happy chance arrived at its destination in time to be laid byRuth Macdonald's plate at lunch time the next day. 

Some quick sense must have warned Ruth, for she gathered her mail up andslipped it unobtrusively into the pocket of her skirt before it could benoticed. Dottie Wetherill had come home with her for lunch and the brightred Y. M. C. A. Triangle on the envelope was so conspicuous. Dottie wascrazy over soldiers and all things military. She would be sure to exclaimand ask questions. She was one of those people who always found outeverything about you that you did not keep under absolute lock and key. 

Every day since she had written her letter to Cameron Ruth had watchedfor an answer, her cheeks glowing sometimes with the least bit ofmortification that she should have written at all to have received thisrebuff. Had he, after all, misunderstood her? Or had the letter goneastray, or the man gone to the front? She had almost given up expectingan answer now after so many weeks, and the nice warm olive-drab sweaterand neatly knitted socks with extra long legs and bright lines of colorat the top, with the wristlets and muffler lay wrapped in tissue paper atthe very bottom of a drawer in the chiffonier where she would seldom seeit and where no one else would ever find it and question her. Probably byand by when the colored draftees were sent away she would get them outand carry them down to the headquarters to be given to some needy man. She felt humiliated and was beginning to tell herself that it was all herown fault and a good lesson for her. She had even decided not to go andsee John Cameron's mother again lest that, too, might be misunderstood. It seemed that the frank true instincts of her own heart had been wrong, and she was getting what she justly deserved for departing from AuntRhoda's strictly conventional code. 

Nevertheless, the letter in her pocket which she had not been able tolook at carefully enough to be sure if she knew the writing, crackled andrustled and set her heart beating excitedly, and her mind to wonderingwhat it might be. She answered Dottie Wetherill's chatter with distraughtmonosyllables and absent smiles, hoping that Dottie would feel itnecessary to go home soon after lunch. 

But it presently became plain that Dottie had no intention of going homesoon; that she had come for a purpose and that she was plying all herarts to accomplish it. Ruth presently roused from her reverie to realizethis and set herself to give Dottie as little satisfaction as possibleout of her task. It was evident that she had been sent to discover theexact standing and relation in which Ruth held Lieutenant HarryWainwright. Ruth strongly suspected that Dottie's brother Bob had beenthe instigator of the mission, and she had no intention of giving him theinformation. 

So Ruth's smiles came out and the inscrutable twinkle grew in her lovelyeyes. Dottie chattered on sentence after sentence, paragraph afterparagraph, theme after theme, always rounding up at the end with someperfectly obvious leading question. Ruth answered in all apparentinnocence and sincerity, yet with an utterly different turn of theconversation from what had been expected, and with an indifference thatwas hopelessly baffling unless the young ambassador asked a point blankquestion, which she hardly dared to do of Ruth Macdonald without moreencouragement. And so at last a long two hours dragged thus away, andfinally Dottie Wetherill at the end of her small string, and at a lossfor more themes on which to trot around again to the main idea, reluctantly accepted her defeat and took herself away, leaving Ruth toher long delayed letter. 

VIII

Ruth sat looking into space with starry eyes and glowing cheeks after shehad read the letter. It seemed to her a wonderful letter, quite the mostwonderful she had ever received. Perhaps it was because it fitted soperfectly with her ideal of the writer, who from her little girlhood hadalways been a picture of what a hero must be. She used to dream bigthings about him when she was a child. He had been the best baseballplayer in school when he was ten, and the handsomest little rowdy intown, as well as the boldest, bravest champion of the little girls. 

As she grew older and met him occasionally she had always been glad thathe kept his old hero look though often appearing in rough garb. She hadknown they were poor. There had been some story about a loss of money anda long expensive sickness of the father's following an accident whichmade all the circumstances most trying, but she had never heard thedetails. She only knew that most of the girls in her set looked on him asa nobody and would no more have companied with him than with theirfather's chauffeur. After he grew older and began to go to college someof the girls began to think he was good looking, and to say it was quitecommendable in him to try to get an education. Some even unearthed thefact that his had been a fine old family in former days and that therehad been wealth and servants once. But the story died down as JohnCameron walked his quiet way apart, keeping to his old friends, and notresponding to the feeble advances of the girls. Ruth had been away atschool in these days and had seldom seen him. When she had there hadalways been that lingering admiration for him from the old days. She hadtold herself that of course he could not be worth much or people wouldknow him. He was probably ignorant and uncultured, and a closeracquaintance would show him far from what her young ideas had picturedher hero. But somehow that day at the station, the look in his face hadrevealed fine feeling, and she was glad now to have her intuitionconcerning him verified by his letter. 

And what a letter it was! Why, no young man of her acquaintance couldhave written with such poetic delicacy. That paragraph about the rose wasbeautiful, and not a bit too presuming, either, in one who had been aperfect stranger all these years. She liked his simple frankness and theeasy way he went back twelve years and began just where they left off. There was none of the bold forwardness that might have been expected inone who had not moved in cultured society. There was no unpleasantassumption of familiarity which might have emphasized her fear that shehad overstepped the bounds of convention in writing to him in the firstplace. On the contrary, her humiliation at his long delayed answer wasall forgotten now. He had understood her perfectly and accepted herletter in exactly the way she had meant it without the least bit offoolishness or unpleasantness. In short, he had written the sort of aletter that the kind of man she had always thought--hoped--he was wouldbe likely to write, and it gave her a surprisingly pleasant feeling ofsatisfaction. It was as if she had discovered a friend all of her own notmade for her by her family, nor one to whom she fell heir because of herwealth and position; but just one she had found, out in the great worldof souls. 

If he had been going to remain at home there might have been a number ofquestions, social and conventional, which would have arisen to bar theway to this free feeling of a friendship, and which she would have had tomeet and reason with before her mind would have shaken itself unhampered;but because he was going away and on such an errand, perhaps never toreturn, the matter of what her friends might think or what the worldwould say, simply did not enter into the question at all. The war hadlifted them both above such ephemeral barriers into the place of visionwhere a soul was a soul no matter what he possessed or who he was. So, asshe sat in her big white room with all its dainty accessories to aluxurious life, fit setting for a girl so lovely, she smiled unhinderedat this bit of beautiful friendship that had suddenly drifted down at herfeet out of a great outside unknown world. She touched the letterthoughtfully with caressing fingers, and the kind of a high look in hereyes that a lady of old must have worn when she thought of her knight. Itcame to her to wonder that she had not felt so about any other of her menfriends who had gone into the service. Why should this special onesoldier boy represent the whole war, as it were, in this way to her. However, it was but a passing thought, and with a smile still upon herlips she went to the drawer and brought out the finely knitted garmentsshe had made, wrapping them up with care and sending them at once upontheir way. It somehow gave her pleasure to set aside a small engagementshe had for that afternoon until she had posted the package herself. 

Even then, when she took her belated way to a little gathering in honorof one of her girl friends who was going to be married the next week to ayoung aviator, she kept the smile on her lips and the dreamy look in hereyes, and now and then brought herself back from the chatter around herto remember that something pleasant had happened. Not that there was anyfoolishness in her thoughts. There was too much dignity and simplicityabout the girl, young as she was, to allow her to deal even with her ownthoughts in any but a maidenly way, and it was not in the ordinary way ofa maid with a man that she thought of this young soldier. He was so farremoved from her life in every way, and all the well-drilled formalities, that it never occurred to her to think of him in the same way she thoughtof her other men friends. 

A friend who understood her, and whom she could understand. That was whatshe had always wanted and what she had never quite had with any of heryoung associates. One or two had approached to that, but always there hadbeen a point at which they had fallen short. That she should make thisman her friend whose letter crackled in her pocket, in that intimatesense of the word, did not occur to her even now. He was somehow setapart for service in her mind; and as such she had chosen him to be herspecial knight, she to be the lady to whom he might look forencouragement--whose honor he was going forth to defend. It was a mistydreamy ideal of a thought. Somehow she would not have picked out anyother of her boy friends to be a knight for her. They were too flippant, too careless and light hearted. The very way in which they lighted theirmultitudinous cigarettes and flipped the match away gave impression thatthey were going to have the time of their lives in this war. They mighthave patriotism down at the bottom of all this froth and boasting, doubtless they had; but there was so little seriousness about them thatone would never think of them as knights, defenders of some great causeof righteousness. Perhaps she was all wrong. Perhaps it was only her oldbaby fancy for the little boy who could always "lick" the other boys andsave the girls from trouble that prejudiced her in his favor, but atleast it was pleasant and a great relief to know that her impulsiveletter had not been misunderstood. 

The girls prattled of this one and that who were "going over" soon, toldof engagements and marriages soon to occur; criticized the brides andgrooms to be; declared their undying opinions about what was fitting fora war bride to wear; and whether they would like to marry a man who hadto go right into war and might return minus an arm or an eye. Theydiscoursed about the U-boats with a frothy cheerfulness that made Ruthshudder; and in the same breath told what nice eyes a young captain hadwho had recently visited the town, and what perfectly lovely uniforms hewore. They argued with serious zeal whether a girl should wear anolive-drab suit this year if she wanted to look really smart. 

They were the girls among whom she had been brought up, and Ruth was usedto their froth, but somehow to-day it bored her beyond expression. Shewas glad to make an excuse to get away and she drove her little cararound by the way of John Cameron's home hoping perhaps to get a glimpseof his mother again. But the house had a shut up look behind the vinethat he had trained, as if it were lonely and lying back in a long waittill he should come--or not come! A pang went through her heart. For thefirst time she thought what it meant for a young life like that to besilenced by cold steel. The home empty! The mother alone! His ambitionsand hopes unfulfilled! It came to her, too, that if he were her knight hemight have to die for her--for his cause! She shuddered and swept theunpleasant thought away, but it had left its mark and would return again. 

On the way back she passed a number of young soldiers home on twenty-fourhour leave from the nearby camps. They saluted most eagerly, and she knewthat any one of them would have gladly occupied the vacant seat in hercar, but she was not in the mood to talk with them. She felt that therewas something to be thought out and fixed in her mind, some impressionthat life had for her that afternoon that she did not want to lose in themild fritter of gay banter that would be sure to follow if she stoppedand took home some of the boys. So she bowed graciously and swept by at ahigh speed as if in a great hurry. The war! The war! It was beatingitself into her brain again in much the same way it had done on thatmorning when the drafted men went away, only now it had taken on a morepersonal touch. She kept seeing the lonely vine-clad house where that onesoldier had lived, and which he had left so desolate. She kept thinkinghow many such homes and mothers there must be in the land. 

That evening when she was free to go to her room she read John Cameron'sletter again, and then, feeling almost as if she were childish in herhaste, she sat down and wrote an answer. Somehow that second reading madeher feel his wish for an answer. It seemed a mute appeal that she couldnot resist. 

When John Cameron received that letter and the accompanying package hewas lifted into the seventh heaven for a little while. He forgot all hismisgivings, he even forgot Lieutenant Wainwright who had but that daybecome a most formidable foe, having been transferred to Cameron'scompany, where he was liable to be commanding officer in absence of thecaptain, and where frequent salutes would be inevitable. It had been aterrible blow to Cameron. But now it suddenly seemed a small matter. Heput on his new sweater and swelled around the way the other boys did, letting them all admire him. He examined the wonderful socks almostreverently, putting a large curious finger gently on the red and bluestripes and thrilling with the thought that her fingers had plied theneedles in those many, many stitches to make them. He almost felt itwould be sacrilege to wear them, and he laid them away most carefully andlocked them into the box under his bed lest some other fellow shouldadmire and desire them to his loss. But with the letter he walked awayinto the woods as far as the bounds of the camp would allow and read andreread it, rising at last from it as one refreshed from a comforting mealafter long fasting. It was on the way back to his barracks that night, walking slowly under the starlight, not desiring to be back until thelast minute before night taps because he did not wish to break thewonderful evening he had spent with her, that he resolved to try to getleave the next Saturday and go home to thank her. 

Back in the barracks with the others he fairly scintillated with wit andkept his comrades in roars of laughter until the officer of the nightsuppressed them summarily. But long after the others were asleep he laythinking of her, and listening to the singing of his soul as he watched astar that twinkled with a friendly gleam through a crack in the roofabove his cot. Once again there came the thought of God, and a feeling ofgratitude for this lovely friendship in his life. If he knew where Godwas he would like to thank Him. Lying so and looking up to the star hebreathed from his heart a wordless thanksgiving. 

The next night he wrote and told her he was coming, and asked permissionto call and thank her face to face. Then he fairly haunted the postoffice at mail time the rest of the week hoping for an answer. He had notwritten his mother about his coming, for he meant not to go this week ifthere came no word from Ruth. Besides, it would be nice to surprise hismother. Then there was some doubt about his getting a pass anyway, and sobetween the two anxieties he was kept busy up to the last minute. ButFriday evening he got his pass, and in the last mail came a specialdelivery from Ruth, just a brief note saying she had been away from homewhen his letter arrived, but she would be delighted to see him on Sundayafternoon as he had suggested. 

He felt like a boy let loose from school as he brushed up his uniform andpolished his big army shoes while his less fortunate companions kiddedhim about the girl he was going to see. He denied their thrusts joyously, in his heart repudiating any such personalities, yet somehow it waspleasant. He had never realized how pleasant it would be to have a girland be going to see her--such a girl! Of course, she was not for him--notwith that possessiveness. But she was a friend, a real friend, and hewould not let anything spoil the pleasure of that!

He had not thought anything in his army experience could be so excitingas that first ride back home again. Somehow the deference paid to hisuniform got into his blood and made him feel that people all along theline really did care for what the boys were doing for them. It made camplife and hardships seem less dreary. 

It was great to get back to his little mother and put his big arms aroundher again. She seemed so small. Had she shrunken since he left her or washe grown so much huskier with the out of door life? Both, perhaps, and helooked at her sorrowfully. She was so little and quiet and brave to bearlife all alone. If he only could get back and get to succeeding in lifeso that he might make some brightness for her. She had borne so much, andshe ought not to have looked so old and worn at her age! For a briefinstant again his heart was almost bitter, and he wondered what God meantby giving his good little mother so much trouble. Was there a God whensuch things could be? He resolved to do something about finding out thisvery day. 

It was pleasant to help his mother about the kitchen, saving her as shehad not been saved since he left, telling her about the camp, andlistening to her tearful admiration of him. She could scarcely take hereyes from him, he seemed so tall and big and handsome in his uniform; heappeared so much older and more manly that her heart yearned for her boywho seemed to be slipping away from her. It was so heavenly blessed tosit down beside him and sew on a button and mend a torn spot in hisflannel shirt and have him pat her shoulder now and then contentedly. 

Then with pride she sent him down to the store for something nice fordinner, and watched him through the window with a smile, the tearsrunning down her cheeks. How tall and straight he walked! How like hisfather when she first knew him! She hoped the neighbors all were lookingout and would see him. Her boy! Her soldier boy! And he must go away fromher, perhaps to die!

But--_he was here to-day_! She would not think of the rest. She wouldrejoice now in his presence. 

He walked briskly down the street past the houses that had been familiarall his life, meeting people who had never been wont to notice himbefore; and they smiled upon him from afar now; greeted him withenthusiasm, and turned to look after him as he passed on. It gave him acurious feeling to have so much attention from people who had never knownhim before. It made him feel strangely small, yet filled with a greatpride and patriotism for the country that was his, and the governmentwhich he now represented to them all. He was something more to them nowthan just one of the boys about town who had grown up among them. He wasa soldier of the United States. He had given his life for the cause ofrighteousness. The bitterness he might have felt at their former ignoringof him, was all swallowed up in their genuine and hearty friendliness. 

He met the white-haired minister, kindly and dignified, who paused to askhim how he liked camp life and to commend him as a soldier; and lookingin his strong gentle face John Cameron remembered his resolve. 

He flashed a keen look at the gracious countenance and made up his mindto speak:

"I'd like to ask you a question, Doctor Thurlow. It's been bothering mequite a little ever since this matter of going away to fight has been inmy mind. Is there any way that a man--that _I_ can find God? That is, ifthere is a God. I've never thought much about it before, but life downthere in camp makes a lot of things seem different, and I've beenwondering. I'm not sure what I believe. Is there anyway I can find out?"

A pleasant gleam of surprise and delight thrilled into the deep blue eyesof the minister. It was startling. It almost embarrassed him for amoment, it was so unexpected to have a soldier ask a question about God. It was almost mortifying that he had never thought it worth while to takethe initiative on that question with the young man. 

"Why, certainly!" he said heartily. "Of course, of course. I'm very gladto know you are interested in those things. Couldn't you come in to mystudy and talk with me. I think I could help you. I'm sure I could. "

"I haven't much time, " said Cameron shyly, half ashamed now that he hadopened his heart to an almost stranger. He was not even his mother'sminister, and he was a comparative newcomer in the town. How had he cometo speak to him so impulsively?

"I understand, exactly, of course, " said the minister with growingeagerness. "Could you come in now for five or ten minutes? I'll turn backwith you and you can stop on your way, or we can talk as we go. Were youthinking of uniting with the church? We have our communion the firstSunday of next month. I should be very glad if you could arrange. We havea number of young people coming in now. I'd like to see you come withthem. The church is a good safe place to be. It was established by God. It is a school in which to learn of Him. It is----"

"But I'm not what you would call a Christian!" protested Cameron. "Idon't even know that I believe in the Bible. I don't know what yourchurch believes. I don't have a very definite idea what any churchbelieves. I would be a hypocrite to stand up and join a church when Iwasn't sure there was a God. "

"My dear young fellow!" said the minister affectionately. "Not at all!Not at all! The church is the place for young people to come when theyhave doubts. It is a shelter, and a growing place. Just trust yourself toGod and come in among His people and your doubts will vanish. Don't worryabout doubts. Many people have doubts. Just let them alone and putyourself in the right way and you will forget them. I should be glad totalk with you further. I would like to see you come into communion withGod's people. If you want to find God you should come where He haspromised to be. It is a great thing to have a fine young fellow like you, and a soldier, array himself on the side of God. I would like to see youstand up on the right side before you go out to meet danger and perhapsdeath. "

John Cameron stood watching him as he talked. 

"He's a good old guy, " he thought gravely, "but he doesn't get my point. He evidently believes what he says, but I don't just see goingblindfolded into a church. However, there's something to what he saysabout going where God is if I want to find him. "

Out loud he merely said:

"I'll think about it, Doctor, and perhaps come in to see you the nexttime I'm home. " Then he excused himself and went on to the store. 

As he walked away he said to himself:

"I wonder what Ruth Macdonald would say if I asked her the same question?I wonder if she has thought anything about it? I wonder if I'd ever havethe nerve to ask her?"

The next morning he suggested to his mother that they go to DoctorThurlow's church together. She would have very much preferred going toher own church with him, but she knew that he did not care for theminister and had never been very friendly with the people, so she putaside her secret wish and went with him. To tell the truth she was veryproud to go anywhere with her handsome soldier son, and one thing thatmade her the more willing was that she remembered that the Macdonaldsalways went to the Presbyterian church, and perhaps they would be thereto-day and Ruth would see them. But she said not a word of this to herboy. 

John spent most of the time with his mother. He went up to college for anhour or so Saturday evening, dropping in on his fraternity for a fewminutes and realizing what true friends he had among the fellows who wereleft, though most of them were gone. He walked about the familiar rooms, looking at the new pictures, photographs of his friends in uniform. Thisone was a lieutenant in Officers' Training Camp. That one had gone withthe Ambulance Corps. Tom was with the Engineers, and Jimmie and Sam hadjoined the Tank Service. Two of the fellows were in France in the frontranks, another had enlisted in the Marines, it seemed that hardly anywere left, and of those three had been turned down for some slightphysical defect, and were working in munition factories and theship-yard. Everything was changed. The old playmates had become men withearnest purposes. He did not stay long. There was a restlessness about itall that pulled the strings of his heart, and made him realize howdifferent everything was. 

Sunday morning as he walked to church with his mother he wondered why hehad never gone more with her when he was at home. It seemed a pleasantthing to do. 

The service was beautifully solemn, and Doctor Thurlow had many graciouswords to say of the boys in the army, and spent much time reading lettersfrom those at the front who belonged to the church and Sunday school, andspoke of the "supreme sacrifice" in the light of a saving grace; but thesermon was a gentle ponderous thing that got nowhere, spiced toward itsclose with thrilling scenes from battle news. John Cameron as he listeneddid not feel that he had found God. He did not feel a bit enlightened byit. He laid it to his own ignorance and stupidity, though, and determinednot to give up the search. The prayer at the close of the sermon somehowclinched this resolve because there was something so genuine and sweetand earnest about it. He could not help thinking that the man might knowmore of God than he was able to make plain to his hearers. He had reallynever noticed either a prayer or a sermon before in his life. He had satin the room with very few. He wondered if all sermons and prayers werelike these and wished he had noticed them. He had never been much of achurch goer. 

But the climax, the real heart of his whole two days, was after Sundaydinner when he went out to call upon Ruth Macdonald. And it wascharacteristic of his whole reticent nature, and the way he had beenbrought up, that he did not tell his mother where he was going. It hadnever occurred to him to tell her his movements when they did notdirectly concern her, and she had never brought herself up to ask him. Itis the habit of some women, and many mothers. 

A great embarrassment fell upon him as he entered the grounds of theMacdonald place, and when he stood before the plate-glass doors waitingfor an answer to his ring he would have turned and fled if he had notpromised to come. 

It was perhaps not an accident that Ruth let him in herself and took himto a big quiet library with wide-open windows overlooking the lawn, andheavy curtains shutting them in from the rest of the house, where, to hisgreat amazement, he could feel at once at ease with her and talk to herjust as he had done in her letters and his own. 

Somehow it was like having a lifetime dream suddenly fulfilled to besitting this way in pleasant converse with her, watching the lights andshadows of expression flit across her sensitive face, and knowing thatthe light in her eyes was for him. It seemed incredible, but sheevidently enjoyed talking to him. Afterwards he thought about it as iftheir souls had been calling to one another across infinite space, thingsthat neither of them could quite hear, and now they were within hailingdistance. 

He had thanked her for the sweater and other things, and they had talkeda little about the old school days and how life changed people, when hehappened to glance out of the window near him and saw a man in officer'suniform approaching. He stopped short in the midst of a sentence androse, his face set, his eyes still on the rapidly approaching soldiers:

"I'm sorry, " he said, "I shall have to go. It's been wonderful to come, but I must go at once. Perhaps you'll let me go out this way. It is ashorter cut. Thank you for everything, and perhaps if there's everanother time--I'd like to come again----"

"Oh, please don't go yet!" she said putting out her hand in protest. Buthe grasped the hand with a quick impulsive grip and with a hasty: "I'msorry, but I must!" he opened the glass door to the side piazza and wasgone. 

In much bewilderment and distress Ruth watched him stride away toward thehedge and disappear. Then she turned to the front window and caught aglimpse of Lieutenant Wainwright just mounting the front steps. What didit all mean?

IX

Ruth tried to control her perturbation and meet her guest with anunruffled countenance, but there was something about the bland smugcountenance of Lieutenant Wainwright that irritated her. To have herfirst pleasant visit with Cameron suddenly broken up in this mysteriousfashion, and Wainwright substituted for Cameron was somehow like taking abite of some pleasant fruit and having it turn out plain potato in one'smouth. It was so sudden, like that. She could not seem to get herequilibrium. Her mind was in a whirl of question and she could not focusit on her present caller nor think of anything suitable to say to him. She was not even sure but that he was noticing that she was distraught. 

To have John Cameron leave in that precipitate manner at the sight ofHarry Wainwright! It was all too evident that he had seen him through thewindow. But they were fellow townsmen, and had gone to school together!Surely he knew him! Of course, Harry was a superior officer, but Cameronwould not be the kind of man to mind that. She could not understand it. There had been a look in his face--a set look! There must be somethingbehind it all. Some reason why he did not want to be seen by Wainwright. Surely Cameron had nothing of which to be ashamed! The thought brought asudden dismay. What did she know about Cameron after all? A look, asmile, a bit of boyish gallantry. He might be anything but fine in hisprivate life, of course, and Harry might be cognizant of the fact. Yet hedid not look like that. Even while the thought forced itself into hermind she resented it and resisted it. Then turning to her guest who wasgiving an elaborate account of how he had saved a woman's life in anautomobile accident, she interrupted him:

"Harry, what do you know about John Cameron?" she asked impulsively. 

Wainwright's face darkened with an ugly frown. 

"More than I want to know, " he answered gruffly. "He's rotten! That'sall! Why?" He eyed her suspiciously. 

There was something in his tone that put her on the defensive at once:

"Oh, I saw him to-day, and I was wondering, " she answered evasively. 

"It's one of the annoyances of army life that we have to be herded upwith all sorts of cattle!" said Wainwright with a disdainful curl of hisbaby mustache. "But I didn't come here to talk about John Cameron. I cameto tell you that I'm going to be married, Ruth. I'm going to be marriedbefore I go to France!"

"Delightful!" said Ruth pleasantly. "Do I know the lady?"

"Indeed you do, " he said watching her with satisfaction. "You've known, for several years that you were the only one for me, and I've come totell you that I won't stand any more dallying. I mean business now!"

He crossed his fat leather puttees creakily and swelled out, trying tolook firm. He had decided that he must impress her with the seriousnessof the occasion. 

But Ruth only laughed merrily. He had been proposing to her ever since hegot out of short trousers, and she had always laughed him out of it. Thefirst time she told him that she was only a kid and he wasn't much morehimself, and she didn't want to hear any more such talk. Of late he hadgrown less troublesome, and she had been inclined to settle down to theold neighborly playmate relation, so she was not greatly disturbed by theturn of the conversation. In fact, she was too much upset and annoyed bythe sudden departure of Cameron to realize the determined note inWainwright's voice. 

"I mean it!" he said in an offended tone, flattening his double chin androlling out his fat lips importantly. "I'm not to be played with anylonger. "

Ruth's face sobered:

"I certainly never had an idea of playing with you, Harry. I think I'vealways been quite frank with you. "

Wainwright felt that he wasn't getting on quite as well as he hadplanned. He frowned and sat up:

"Now see here, Ruth! Let's talk this thing over!" he said, drawing thebig leather chair in which he was sitting nearer to hers. 

But Ruth's glance had wandered out of the window. "Why, there comesBobbie Wetherill!" she exclaimed eagerly and slipped out of her chair tothe door just as one of Wainwright's smooth fat hands reached out to takehold of the arm of her rocker. "I'll open the door for him. Mary is inthe kitchen and may not hear the bell right away. "

There was nothing for Wainwright to do but make the best of thesituation, although he greeted Wetherill with no very good grace, and hislarge lips pouted out sulkily as he relaxed into his chair again to awaitthe departure of the intruder. 

Lieutenant Wetherill was quite overwhelmed with the warmth of thegreeting he received from Ruth and settled down to enjoy it while itlasted. With a wicked glance of triumph at his rival he laid himself outto make his account of camp life as entertaining as possible. He produceda gorgeous box of bonbons and arranged himself comfortably for theafternoon, while Wainwright's brow grew darker and his lips pouted outfarther and farther under his petted little moustache. It was all a greatbore to Ruth just now with her mind full of the annoyance about Cameron. At least she would have preferred to have had her talk with him and foundout what he was with her own judgment. But anything was better than, a_tęte-ŕ-tęte_ with Wainwright just now; so she ate bonbons and askedquestions, and kept the conversation going, ignoring Wainwright'sincreasing grouch. 

It was a great relief, however, when about half-past four the maidappeared at the door:

"A long distance telephone call for you, Miss Ruth. "

As Ruth was going up the stairs to her own private 'phone she paused tofasten the tie of her low shoe that had come undone and was threateningto trip her, and she heard Harry Wainwright's voice in an angry snarl:

"What business did you have coming here to-day, you darned chump! Youknew what I came for, and you did it on purpose! If you don't get out theminute she gets back I'll put her wise to you and the kind of girls yougo with in no time. And you needn't think you can turn the tables on me, either, for I'll fix you so you won't dare open your fool mouth!"

The sentence finished with an oath and Ruth hurried into her room andshut the door with a sick kind of feeling that her whole little world wasturning black about her. 

It was good to hear the voice of her cousin, Captain La Rue, over the'phone, even though it was but a message that he could not come as he hadpromised that evening. It reassured her that there were good men in theworld. Of course, he was older, but she was sure he had never been whatpeople called "wild, " although he had plenty of courage and spirit. Shehad often heard that good men were few, but it had never seemed to applyto her world but vaguely. Now here of a sudden a slur had been thrown atthree of her young world. John Cameron, it is true, was a comparativestranger, and, of course, she had no means of judging except by the lookin his eyes. She understood in a general way that "rotten" as applied toa young man's character implied uncleanness. John Cameron's eyes weresteady and clear. They did not look that way. But then, how could shetell? And here, this very minute she had been hearing that BobbieWetherill's life was not all that it should be and Wainwright had tacitlyaccepted the possibility of the same weakness in himself. These were boyswith whom she had been brought up. Selfish and conceited she had oftenthought them on occasion, but it had not occurred to her that there mightbe anything worse. She pressed her hands to her eyes and tried to force acalm steadiness into her soul. Somehow she had an utter distaste forgoing back into that library and hearing their boastful chatter. Yet shemust go. She had been hoping all the afternoon for her cousin's arrivalto send the other two away. Now that was out of the question and she mustuse her own tact to get pleasantly rid of them. With a sigh she openedher door and started down stairs again. 

It was Wainwright's blatant voice again that broke through the Sabbathafternoon stillness of the house as she approached the library door:

"Yes, I've got John Cameron all right now!" he laughed. "He won't holdhis head so high after he's spent a few days in the guard-house. Andthat's what they're all going to get that are late coming back this time. I found out before I left camp that his pass only reads till eleveno'clock and the five o'clock train is the last one he can leave Chesteron to get him to camp by eleven. So I hired a fellow that was coming upto buddy-up to Cam and fix it that he is to get a friend of his to takethem over to Chester in time for the train. The fellow don't have to getback himself to-night at all, but he isn't going to let on, you know, soCam will think they're in the same boat. Then they're going to have alittle bit of tire trouble, down in that lonely bit of rough road, thatshort cut between here and Chester, where there aren't any cars passingto help them out, and they'll miss the train at Chester. See? And thenthe man will offer to take them on to camp in his car and they'll getstuck again down beyond Wilmington, lose the road, and switch off towardSingleton--you know, where we took those girls to that littleout-of-the-way tavern that time--and you see Cam getting back to camp intime, don't you?"

Ruth had paused with her hand on the heavy portiere, wide-eyed. 

"But Cameron'll find a way out. He's too sharp. He'll start to walk, orhe'll get some passing car to take him, " said Wetherill with conviction. 

"No, he won't. The fellows are all primed. They're going to catch him inspots where cars don't go, where the road is bad, you know, and nobodybut a fool would go with a car. He won't be noticing before they breakdown because this fellow told him his man could drive a car over the moonand never break down. Besides, I know my men. They'll get away with thejob. There's too much money in it for them to run any risk of losing out. It's all going to happen so quick he won't be ready for anything. "

"Well, you'll have your trouble for your pains. Cam'll explain everythingto the officers and he'll get by. He always does. "

"Not this time. They've just made a rule that no excuses go. There'vebeen a lot of fellows coming back late drunk. And you see that's how wemean to wind up. They are going to get him drunk, and then we'll see iflittle Johnnie will go around with his nose in the air any longer! I'mgoing to run down to the tavern late this evening to see the fun myself!"

"You can't do it! Cam won't drink! It's been tried again and again. He'drather die!"

But the girl at the door had fled to her room on velvet shod feet andclosed her door, her face white with horror, her lips set with purpose, her heart beating wildly. She must put a stop somehow to this diabolicalplot against him. Whether he was worthy or not they should not do thisthing to him! She rang for the maid and began putting on her hat and coatand flinging a few things into a small bag. She glanced at her watch. Itwas a quarter to five. Could she make it? If she only knew which way hehad gone! Would his mother have a telephone? Her eyes scanned the Ccolumn hurriedly. Yes, there it was. She might have known he would notallow her to be alone without a telephone. 

The maid appeared at the door. 

"Mary, " she said, trying to speak calmly, "tell Thomas to have the graycar ready at once. He needn't bring it to the house, I will come out theback way. Please take this bag and two long coats out, and when I am gonego to the library and ask the two gentlemen there to excuse me. Say thatI am suddenly called away to a friend in trouble. If Aunt Rhoda returnssoon tell her I will call her up later and let her know my plans. That isall. I will be down in two or three minutes and I wish to start withoutdelay!"

Mary departed on her errand and Ruth went to the telephone and called upthe Cameron number. 

The sadness of the answering voice struck her even in her haste. Her owntone was eager, intimate, as she hastened to convey her message. 

"Mrs. Cameron, this is Ruth Macdonald. Has your son left yet? I waswondering if he would care to be taken to the train in our car?"

"Oh! he has _just gone_!" came a pitiful little gasp that had a sob atthe end of it. "He went in somebody's car and they were late coming. I'mafraid he is going to miss his train and he has got to get it or he willbe in trouble! That is the last train that connects with Wilmington. "

Ruth's heart leaped to her opportunity. 

"Suppose we try to catch him then, " proposed Ruth gleefully. "My car cango pretty fast, and if he has missed the train perhaps we can carry himon to Wilmington. Would you like to try?"

"Oh, could we?" the voice throbbed with eagerness. 

"Hurry up then. My car is all ready. I'll be down there in three minutes. We've no time to waste. Put on something warm!"

She hung up the receiver without waiting for further reply, and hurriedsoftly out of the room and down the back stairs. 

Thomas was well trained. The cars were always in order. He was used toRuth's hurry calls, and when she reached the garage she found the carstanding in the back street waiting for her. In a moment more she wasrushing on her way toward the village without having aroused thesuspicion of the two men who so impatiently awaited her return. Mrs. Cameron was ready, eager as a child, standing on the sidewalk with agreat blanket shawl over her arm and looking up the street for her. 

It was not until they had swept through the village, over the bridge, andwere out on the broad highway toward Chester that Ruth began to realizewhat a wild goose chase she had undertaken. Just where did she expect tofind them, anyway? It was now three minutes to five by the little clockin the car and it was a full fifteen minutes' drive to Chester. The planhad been to delay him on the way to the train, and there had been mentionof a short cut. Could that be the rough stony road that turned downsharply just beyond the stone quarry? It seemed hardly possible thatanybody would attempt to run a car over that road. Surely John Cameronknew the roads about here well enough to advise against it. Still, Ruthknew the locality like a book and that was the only short cut thereabout. If they had gone down there they might emerge at the other end just intime to miss the train, and then start on toward Wilmington. Or theymight turn back and take the longer way if they found the short roadutterly impassable. Which should she take? Should she dare that rockyway? If only there might be some tracks to guide her. But the road washard and dusty and told no tales of recent travelers. They skimmed downthe grade past the stone quarry, and the short cut flashed into view, rough and hilly, turning sharply away behind a group of spruce trees. Itwas thick woods beyond. If she went that way and got into any troublewith her machine the chances were few that anyone would some along tohelp. She had but a moment to decide, and something told her that thelong way was the safe one and shorter in the end. She swept on, herengine throbbing with that pleasant purr of expensive well-groomedmachinery, the car leaping forward as if it delighted in the high speed. The little woman by her side sat breathless and eager, with shining eyes, looking ahead for her boy. 

They passed car after car, and Ruth scanned the occupants keenly. Somewere filled with soldiers, but John Cameron was not among them. She beganto be afraid that perhaps she ought after all to have gone down thathilly way and made sure they were not there. She was not quite sure wherethat short road came out. If she knew she might run up a little way fromthis further end. 

The two women sat almost silent, straining their eyes ahead. They hadsaid hardly a word since the first greeting. Each seemed to understandthe thought of the other without words. For the present they had but onecommon object, to find John Cameron. 

Suddenly, as far ahead as they could see, a car darted out of the woodedroadside, swung into their road and plunged ahead at a tremendous rate. They had a glimpse of khaki uniforms, but it was much too far away todistinguish faces or forms. Nevertheless, both women fastened their eyesupon it with but one thought. Ruth put on more speed and forged ahead, thankful that she was not within city lines yet, and that there was noone about to remind her of the speed limit. Something told her that theman she was seeking was in that car ahead. 

It was a thrilling race. Ruth said no word, but she knew that hercompanion was aware that she was chasing that car. Mrs. Cameron satstraight and tense as if it had been a race of life and death, her cheeksglowing and her eyes shining. Ruth was grateful that she did not talk. Some women would have talked incessantly. 

The other car did not go in to Chester proper at all, but veered awayinto a branch road and Ruth followed, leaping over the road as if it hadbeen a gray velvet ribbon. She did not seem to be gaining on the car; butit was encouraging that they could keep it still in sight. Then therecame a sharp turn of the road and it was gone. They were pulsing alongnow at a tremendous rate. The girl had cast caution to the winds. She washearing the complacent sneer of Harry Wainwright as he boasted how theywould get John Cameron into trouble, and all the force of her strongyoung will was enlisted to frustrate his plans. 

It was growing dusk, and lights leaped out on the munition factories allabout them. Along the river other lights flashed and flickered in thewhite mist that rose like a wreath. But Ruth saw nothing of it all. Shewas straining her eyes for the little black speck of a car which she hadbeen following and which now seemed to be swallowed up by the evening. She had not relaxed her speed, and the miles were whirling by, and shehad a growing consciousness that she might be passing the object of herchase at any minute without knowing it. Presently they came to a junctionof three roads, and she paused. On ahead the road was broad and emptysave for a car coming towards them. Off to the right was a desolate wayleading to a little cemetery. Down to the left a smooth wooded road woundinto the darkness. There were sign boards up. Ruth leaned out and flasheda pocket torch on the board. "TO PINE TREE INN, 7 Miles" it read. Did shefancy it or was it really true that she could hear the distant sound of acar among the pines?

"I'm going down this way!" she said decidedly to her companion, as if heraction needed an explanation, and she turned her car into the new road. 

"But it's too late now, " said Mrs. Cameron wistfully. "The train will begone, of course, even from Wilmington. And you ought to be going home. I'm very wrong to have let you come so far; and it's getting dark. Yourfolks will be worrying about you. That man will likely do his best to gethim to camp in time. "

"No, " said Ruth decidedly, "there's no one at home to worry just now, andI often go about alone rather late. Besides, aren't we having a goodtime? We're going a little further anyway before we give up. "

She began to wonder in her heart if she ought not to have told somebodyelse and taken Thomas along to help. It was rather a questionable thingfor her to do, in the dusk of the evening--to women all alone. But then, she had Mrs. Cameron along and that made it perfectly respectable. But ifshe failed now, what else could she do? Her blood boiled hotly at thethought of letting Harry Wainwright succeed in his miserable plot. Oh, for cousin La Rue! He would have thought a way out of this. If everythingelse failed she would tell the whole story to Captain La Rue and beg himto exonerate John Cameron. But that, of course, she knew would be hard todo, there was so much red tape in the army, and there were so manyunwritten laws that could not be set aside just for private individuals. Still, there must be a way if she had to go herself to someone and tellwhat she had overheard. She set her pretty lips firmly and rode on at abrisk pace down the dark road, switching on her head lights to seem theway here in the woods. And then suddenly, just in time she jerked on thebrake and came to a jarring stop, for ahead of her a big car was sprawledacross the road, and there, rising hurriedly from a kneeling posturebefore the engine, in the full blaze of her headlights, blinking andfrowning with anxiety, stood John Cameron!

X

The end of her chase came so unexpectedly that her wits were completelyscattered. Now that she was face to face with the tall soldier she hadnothing to say for her presence there. What would he think of her? Howcould she explain her coming? She had undertaken the whole thing in suchhaste that she had not planned ahead. Now she knew that from the startshe had understood that she must not explain how she came to be possessedof any information concerning him. She felt a kind of responsible shamefor her old playmate Harry Wainright, and a certain loyalty toward herown social set that prevented her from that, the only possibleexplanation that could make her coming justifiable. So, now in the briefinterval before he had recognized them she must stage the next act, andshe found herself unable to speak, her throat dry, her lips for theinstant paralyzed. It was the jubilant little mother that stepped intothe crisis and did the most natural thing in the world:

"John! Oh John! It's really you! We've caught you!" she cried, and thetroubled young soldier peering into the dusk to discover if here was avehicle he might presume to commandeer to help him out of his predicamentlifted startled eyes to the two faces in the car and strode forward, abandoning with a clang the wrench with which he had been working on thecar. 

"Mother!" he said, a shade of deep anxiety in his voice. "What is thematter? How came you to be here?"

"Why, I came after you, " she said laughing like a girl. "We're going tosee that you get to camp in time. We've made pretty good time so far. Jump in quick and we'll tell you the rest on the way. We mustn't wastetime. "

Cameron's startled gaze turned on Ruth now, and a great wonder anddelight sprang up in his eyes. It was like the day when he went away onthe train, only more so, and it brought a rich flush into Ruth's cheeks. As she felt the hot waves she was glad that she was sitting behind thelight. 

"What! You?" he breathed wonderingly. "But this is too much! And afterthe way I treated you!"

His mother looked wonderingly from one to the other:

"Get in, John, quick. We mustn't lose a minute. Something might delay uslater. " It was plain she was deeply impressed with the necessity for thesoldier not to be found wanting. 

"Yes, please get in quickly, and let us start. Then we can talk!" saidRuth, casting an anxious glance toward the other car. 

His hand went out to the door to open it, the wonder still shining in hisface, when a low murmur like a growl went up behind him. 

Ruth looked up, and there in the full glare of the lights stood two burlycivilians and a big soldier:

"Oh, I say!" drawled the soldier in no very pleasant tone, "you're notgoing to desert us that way! Not after Pass came out of his way for us! Ididn't think you had a yellow streak!"

Cameron paused and a troubled look came into his face. He glanced at theempty back seat with a repression of his disappointment in the necessity. 

"There's another fellow here that has to get back at the same time I do, "he said looking at Ruth hesitatingly. 

"Certainly. Ask him, of course. " Ruth's voice was hearty and put thewhole car at his disposal. 

"There's room for you, too, Chalmers, " he said with relief. "And Passmorewill be glad to get rid of us I suspect. He'll be able to get home soon. There isn't much the matter with that engine. If you do what I told youto that carburetor you'll find it will go all right. Come on, Chalmers. We ought to hurry!"

"No thanks! I stick to my friends!" said the soldier shortly. 

"As you please!" said Cameron stepping on the running board. 

"Not as _you_ please!" said a gruff voice, "I'm running this party and weall go together? See?" A heavy hand came down upon Cameron's shoulderwith a mighty grip. 

Cameron landed a smashing blow under the man's chin which sent himreeling and sprang inside as Ruth threw in the clutch and sent her carleaping forward. The two men in front were taken by surprise and barelygot out of the way in time, but instantly recovered their senses andsprang after the car, the one nearest her reaching for the wheel. Cameron, leaning forward, sent him rolling down the gully, and Ruthturned the car sharply to avoid the other car which was occupying as muchof the road as possible, and left the third man scrambling to his kneesbehind her. It was taking a big chance to dash past that car in thenarrow space over rough ground, but Ruth was not conscious of anythingbut the necessity of getting away. In an instant they were back in theroad and flashing along through the dark. 

"Mother, you better let me help you back here, " said her son leaningforward and almost lifting his mother into the back seat, then steppingover to take her place beside Ruth. 

"Better turn out your back lights!" he said in a quiet, steady voice. "They might follow, you know. They're in an ugly mood. They've beendrinking. "

"Then the car isn't really out of commission?"

"Not seriously. "

"We're not on the right road, did you know? This road goes to The PineTree Inn and Singleton!"

Cameron gave a low exclamation:

"Then they're headed for more liquor. I thought something was up. "

"Is there a cross road back to the Pike?"

"I'm not sure. Probably. I know there is about three miles farther on, almost to the Inn. This is an awful mess to have got you into! I'd ratherhave been in the guard house than have this happen to you!"

"Please don't!" said Ruth earnestly. "It's an adventure! I'm enjoying it. I'm not a doll to be kept in cotton wool!"

"I should say not!" said Cameron with deep admiration in his tone. "Youhaven't shown yourself much of a doll to-night. Some doll, to run a carthe way you did in the face of all that. I'll tell you better what Ithink when we get out of this!"

"They are coming, I believe!" said Ruth glancing back. "Don't you see alight? Look!"

Mrs. Cameron was looking, too, through the little back window. Now shespoke quietly:

"Wouldn't it be better to get out and slip up in the woods till they havegone by?"

"No, mother!" said Cameron quickly, "just you sit quiet where you are andtrust us. "

"Something awful might happen, John!"

"No, mother! Don't you worry!" he said in his gentle, manly tone. Then toRuth: "There's a big barn ahead there on your left. Keep your eye out fora road around behind it. If we could disappear it's too dark for them toknow where we are. Would you care to turn out all the lights and let merun the car? I don't want to boast but there isn't much of anything Ican't do with a car when I have to. "

Instantly Ruth switched out every light and with a relieved "Please!"gave up the wheel to him. They made the change swiftly and silently, andRuth took the post of lookout. 

"Yes, I can see two lights. It might be someone else, mightn't it?"

"Not likely, on this road. But we're not taking any chances, " and withthat the car bumped down across a gully and lurched up to a grassyapproach to a big stone barn that loomed above them, then slid downanother bank and passed close to a great haystack, whose clutching strawfingers reached out to brush their faces, and so swept softly around tothe rear of the barn and stopped. Cameron shut off the engine instantlyand they sat in utter silence listening to the oncoming car. 

"It's they, all right!" whispered Cameron softly. "That's Passmore'svoice. He converses almost wholly in choice profanity. "

His mother's hand stole out to touch his shoulder and he reached aroundand held it close. 

"Don't tremble, mother, we're all safe!" he whispered in a tone so tenderthat Ruth felt a shiver of pleasure pass over her for the mother who hadsuch a son. Also there was the instant thought that a man could not bewholly "rotten" when he could speak to his mother in that tone. 

There was a breathless space when the car paused on the road not far awayand their pursuers stood up and looked around, shouting to one another. There was no mistaking their identity now. Ruth shivered visibly. One ofthem got out of the car and came toward the barn. They could hear himstepping over the stony roadside. Cameron laid a quiet hand of reassuringprotection on her arm that steadied her and made her feel wonderfullysafe once more, and strange to say she found herself lifting up anotherqueer little kind of a prayer. It had never been her habit to pray muchexcept in form. Her heart had seldom needed anything that money could notsupply. 

The man had stumbled across the gully and up toward the barn. They couldhear him swearing at the unevenness of the ground, and Ruth held herbreath and prayed again. A moment more and he was fumbling about for thebarn door and calling for a flash light. Then, like the distant sound ofa mighty angel of deliverance came the rumble of a car in the distance. The men heard it and took it for their quarry on ahead. They climbed intotheir car again and were gone like a flash. 

John Cameron did not wait for them to get far away. He set the car inmotion as soon as they were out of sight, and its expensive mechanismobeyed his direction almost silently as he guided it around the barn, behind the haystack and back again into the road over which they had justcome. 

"Now!" he said as he put the car to its best speed and switched on itsheadlights again. "Now we can beat them to it, I guess, if they come backthis way, which I don't think they will. "

The car dashed over the ground and the three sat silent while they passedinto the woods and over the place where they had first met Cameron. Ruthfelt herself trembling again, and her teeth beginning to chatter from thestrain. Cameron seemed to realize her feeling and turned toward her:

"You've been wonderful!" he said flashing a warm look at her, "and you, too, mother!" lifting his voice a little and turning his head toward theback seat. "I don't believe any other two women in Bryne Haven could havegone through a scene like that and kept absolutely still. You weregreat!" There was that in his voice that lifted Ruth's heart more thanany praise she had ever received for anything. She wanted to make someacknowledgment, but she found to her surprise that tears were choking herthroat so that she could not speak. It was the excitement, of course, shetold herself, and struggled to get control of her emotion. 

They emerged from the woods and in sight of the Pike at last, and Camerondrew a long breath of relief. 

"There, I guess we can hold our own with anyone, now, " he said settlingback in his seat, but relaxing none of his vigilance toward the car whichsped along the highway like a winged thing. "But it's time I heard howyou came to be here. I haven't been able to explain it, during theintervals when I've had any chance at all to think about it. "

"Oh, I just called up your mother to know if it would help you any to betaken to your train, " said Ruth quickly, "and she mentioned that she wasworried lest you would miss it; so I suggested that we try to catch youand take you on to Wilmington or Baltimore or wherever you have to go. Ido hope this delay hasn't spoiled it all. How long does it take to gofrom Baltimore to camp. I've taken the Baltimore trip myself in fivehours. It's only quarter past six yet, do you think we can make it?"

"But you can't go all the way to Baltimore!" he exclaimed. "What wouldyou and mother do at that time of night alone after I go to camp? Yousee, it isn't as if I could stay and come back with you. "

"Oh, we'll just go to a hotel in Baltimore, won't we, Mrs. Cameron? We'llbe all right if we only get you safe to camp. Do you think we can do it?"

"Oh, yes, we can do it all right with this car. But I'm quite sure Iought not to let you do it just for me. What will your people think?"

"I've left word that I've gone to a friend in trouble, " twinkled Ruth. "I'll call them up when I get to Baltimore, and make it all right withAuntie. She will trust me. "

Cameron turned and looked at her wonderingly, reverently. 

"It's wonderful that you should do this for me, " he said in a low tone, quite low, so that the watching wistful mother could not even guess whathe was saying. 

"It's not in the least wonderful, " said Ruth brightly. "Remember thehedge and Chuck Woodcock!" She was beginning to get her self possessionagain. 

"You are paying that old score back in compound interest, " said Cameron. 

That was a wonderful ride rushing along beneath the stars, going back tochildhood's days and getting acquainted again where they left off. Ruthforgot all about the cause of her wild chase, and the two young men shehad left disconsolate in her library at home; forgot her own world inthis new beautiful one, wherein her spirit really communed with anotherspirit; forgot utterly what Wainwright had said about Cameron as more andmore through their talk she came to see the fineness of his character. 

They flashed on from one little village to another, leaving oneclustering glimmer of lights in the distance only to pass to otherclustering groups. It was in their favor that there were not many othertravellers to dispute their way, and they were hindered very little. Cameron had made the trip many times and knew the roads well. They didnot have to hesitate and enquire the way. They made good time. The clockswere striking ten when they reached the outskirts of Baltimore. 

"Now, " said Ruth in a sweetly imperious tone, consulting her timepiece tobe sure she had counted the clock strokes correctly, "do you know whatyou are going to do, Mr. Corporal? You are going to land your mother andme at the nearest hotel, and take the car with you back to camp. You saidone of the fellows had his car down there, so I'm sure you'll be able tofind a place to put it over night. If you find a way to send the car backto us in the morning, well and good. If not your mother and I will gohome by train and the chauffeur can come down to-morrow and bring backthe car; or, better still, you can drive yourself up the next time youget leave off. "

There was much argument about the matter within a brief space of time, but in the end (which came in five minutes) Ruth had her way, and theyoung soldier departed for his camp in the gray car with ample time tomake the short trip, leaving his mother and Ruth at a Baltimore hotel;after having promised to call up in the morning and let them know what hecould do about the car. 

Ruth selected a large double room and went at once to the telephone tocall up her aunt. She found to her relief that that good lady had not yetreturned from her day with a friend in the city, so that no explanationswould be necessary that night. She left word with the servant that shewas in Baltimore with a friend and would probably be at home the next daysometime. Then she turned to find to her dismay that her companion wassitting in a low-armed chair with tears running down her cheeks. 

"Oh, my dear!" she exclaimed rushing over to her, "you are all worn out!"

"Not a bit of it!" sobbed the mother with a smile like sunshine throughher tears. "I was so happy I couldn't keep from crying. Don't you everget that way? I've just been watching you and thinking what a dearbeautiful child you are and how wonderful God has been to send you tohelp my boy. Oh, it was so dreadful to me to think of him going down tocamp with those men! My dear, I smelt liquor on their breath when theycame for him, and I was just crying and praying about it when you calledme up. Of course, I knew my boy wouldn't drink, but so many accidents canhappen with automobiles when the driver is drunk! My dear, I never canthank you enough!"

They were both too excited to sleep soon, but long after the mother wasasleep Ruth lay awake going over the whole day and wondering. There wereso many things about the incident of the afternoon and evening, now thatthey were over, that were utterly out of accord with her whole lifeheretofore. She felt intuitively that her aunt would never understand ifshe were to explain the whole proceeding. There were so many laws of herlittle world of conventionalities that she had transgressed, and so manyqualms of a belated conscience about whether she ought to have done it atall. What would Cameron think of her, anyway? Her cheeks burned hot inthe dark over that question. Strange she had not thought of it at alleither beforehand or while she sat beside him during that wonderful ride!And now the thing that Wainwright had said shouted itself out to herears: "Rotten! Rotten! Rotten!" like a dirge. Suppose he were? It_couldn't_ be true. It _just couldn't_, but suppose he were? Well, suppose he were! How was she hurt by doing a kind act? Having taken thatstand against all her former ideas Ruth had instant peace and driftedinto dreams of what she had been enjoying, the way suddenly lit by asleepy remembrance of Wetherill's declaration: "He won't drink! You can'tmake him! It's been tried again and again!" There was evidence in hisfavor. Why hadn't she remembered that before? And his mother! She hadbeen so sure of him!

The telephone bell wakened her with a message from camp. His voicegreeted her pleasantly with the word that it was all right, he hadreached camp in plenty of time, found a good place for the car, and itwould be at the hotel at nine o'clock. Ruth turned from the phone with avague disappointment. He had not said a word of thanks or good-bye oranything, only that he must hurry. Not even a word to his mother. Butthen, of course, men did not think of those little things, perhaps, aswomen did, and maybe it was just as well for him to take it all as amatter of course. It made it less embarrassing for her. 

But when they went down to the car, behold he was in it!

"I got leave off for the morning, " he explained smiling. "I told mycaptain all about how you got me back in time when I'd missed the trainand he told me to see you as far as Wilmington and catch the noon trainback from there. He's a peach of a captain. If my lieutenant had beenthere I wouldn't have got a chance to ask him. I was afraid of that lastnight. But for good luck the lieutenant has a two days' leave this time. He's a mess!"

Ruth looked at him musingly. Was Harry Wainwright the lieutenant?

They had a golden morning together, and talked of many things that weldeda friendship already well begun. 

"Weren't you at all frightened last night?" asked Cameron once, lookingat the delicate beauty of the face beside him and noting the strength andsweetness of it. 

Mrs. Cameron was dozing in the back seat and they felt quite alone andfree. Ruth looked up at him frankly:

"Why, yes, I think I was for a minute or two while we were behind thatbarn, but----Did you ever pray when you were in a trying situation?"

He looked down earnestly into her face, half startled at her words:

"Why, I don't know that I ever did. I'm not quite sure if it waspraying. "

"Well, I don't know that I ever did before, " she went on thoughtfully, "but last night when those men got out of their car in front of the barnso near us again, I found myself praying. " She dropped her eyes halfembarrassed: "Just as if I were a frightened little child I found myselfsaying: 'God help us! God help us!' And right away we heard that othercar coming and the men went away. It somehow seemed--well, strange! Iwondered if anybody else ever had an experience like that. "

"I've heard of them, " said Cameron gravely. "I've wondered sometimesmyself. Do you believe in God?"

"Oh, yes!" said Ruth quite firmly. "Of course. What use would there be inanything if there wasn't a God?"

"But do you believe we humans can ever really--well, _find_ Him? On thisearth, I mean. "

"Why, I don't know that I ever thought about it, " she answeredbewildered. "Find Him? In what way do you mean?"

"Why, get in touch with Him? Get to know Him, perhaps. Be on such termswith Him that one could call out in a time like last night, you know;or--well, say in a battle! I've been thinking a lot about thatlately--naturally. "

"Oh!" gasped Ruth softly, "of course. I hadn't thought about that much, either. We've been so thoughtless--and--and sort of happy you know, justlike butterflies, we girls! I haven't realized that men were going out toface _Death_!"

"It isn't that I'm afraid to die, " said Cameron proudly lifting his chinas if dying were a small matter, "not just the dying part. I reckon I'vebeen through worse than that a dozen times. That wouldn't last long. It's--the other part. I have a feeling there'll be a little somethingmore expected of me than just to have tried to get the most fun out oflife. I've been thinking if there is a God He'd expect us to find it outand make things straight between us somehow. I suppose I don't makemyself very plain. I don't believe I know myself just what I mean. "

"I think I understand just a little, " said Ruth, "I have never thoughtabout it before, but I'm going to now. It's something we ought to thinkabout, I guess. In a sense it's something that each one of us has tothink, whether we are going into battle or not, isn't it?"

"I suppose it is, only we never realize it when things are going alongall right, " said Cameron. "It seems queer that everybody that's everlived on this earth has had this question to face sooner or later andmost of them haven't done much about it. The few people who profess tohave found a way to meet it we call cranks, or else pick flaws in the waythey live; although it does seem to me that if I really found God so Iwas sure He was there and cared about me, I'd manage to live a littledecenter life than some do. "

They drifted into other topics and all too soon they reached Wilmingtonand had to say good-bye. But the thought stayed with Ruth more or lessduring the days that followed, and crept into her letters when she wroteto Corporal Cameron, as she did quite often in these days; and still nosolution had come to the great question which was so like the one of old, "What shall I do to be saved?" It came and went during the days thatfollowed, and now and again the fact that it had originated in a talkwith Cameron clashed badly in her mind with that word "Rotten" thatWainwright had used about him. So that at last she resolved to talk toher cousin, Captain La Rue, the next time he came up. 

"Cousin Captain, " she said, "do you know a boy at your camp from BryneHaven named John Cameron?"

"Indeed I do!" said the captain. 

"What kind of a man is he?"

"The best young man I know in every way, " answered the captain promptly. "If the world were made up of men like him it would be a pretty goodplace in which to live. Do you know him?"

"A little, " said Ruth evasively, with a satisfied smile on her lips. "Hismother is in our Red Cross now. She thinks he's about right, of course, but mothers usually do, I guess. I'll have to tell her what you said. Itwill please her. He used to be in school with me years ago. I haven'tseen much of him since. "

"Well, all I have to say is, improve your acquaintance if you get thechance. He's worth ten to one of your society youths that loll aroundhere almost every time I come. "

"Now, Cousin Captain!" chided Ruth. But she went off smiling and she keptall his words in her heart. 

XII

Corporal Cameron did not soon return to his native town. An epidemic ofmeasles broke out in camp just before Thanksgiving and pursued itstantalizing course through his special barracks with strenuous vigor. Quarantine was put on for three weeks, and was but lifted for a few hourswhen a new batch of cases came down. Seven weeks more of isolationfollowed, when the men were not allowed away from the barracks except forlong lonely walks, or gallops across camp. Even the mild excitements ofthe Y. M. C. A. Huts were not for them in these days. They were much shut upto themselves, and latent tendencies broke loose and ran riot. Shootingcrap became a passion. They gambled as long as they had a dollar left orcould get credit on the next month's pay day. Then they gambled for theirshirts and their bayonets. All day long whenever they were in thebarracks, you could hear the rattle of the dice, and the familiar call of"Phoebe, " "Big Dick, " "Big Nick, " and "Little Joe. " When they were not ondrill the men would infest the barracks for hours at a time, gathered incrouching groups about the dice, the air thick and blue with cigarettesmoke; while others had nothing better to do than to sprawl on their cotsand talk; and from their talk Cameron often turned away nauseated. Thelow ideals, the open boasting of shame, the matter-of-course convictionthat all men and most women were as bad as themselves, filled him with adeep boiling rage, and he would close his book or throw down the paperwith which he was trying to while the hour, and fling forth into the coldair for a solitary ride or walk. 

He was sitting thus a cold cheerless December day with a French book hehad recently sent for, trying to study a little and prepare himself forthe new country to which he was soon going. 

The door of the barracks opened letting in a rush of cold air, and closedagain quickly. A tall man in uniform with the red triangle on his armstood pulling off his woolen gloves and looking about him. Nobody paidany attention to him. Cameron was deep in his book and did not evennotice him. Off at his left a new crap game was just starting. Thephraseology beat upon his accustomed ears like the buzz of bees ormosquitos. 

"I'll shoot a buck!"

"You're faded!"

"Come on now there, dice! Remember the baby's shoes!"

Cameron had ceased to hear the voices. He was struggling with a difficultFrench idiom. 

The stranger took his bearings deliberately and walked over to Cameron, sitting down with a friendly air on the nearest cot. 

"Would you be interested in having one of my little books?" he asked, andhis voice had a clear ring that brought Cameron's thoughts back to thebarracks again. He looked up for a curt refusal. He did not wish to bebothered now, but something in the young man's earnest face held him. Y. M. C. A. Men in general were well enough, but Cameron wasn't crazy aboutthem, especially when they were young. But this one had a look about himthat proclaimed him neither a slacker nor a sissy. Cameron hesitated:

"What kind of a book?" he asked in a somewhat curt manner. 

The boy, for he was only a boy though he was tall as a man, did not hedgebut went straight to the point, looking eagerly at the soldier:

"A pocket Testament, " he said earnestly, and laid in Cameron's hand alittle book with limp leather covers. Cameron took it up half curiously, and then looked into the other's face almost coldly. 

"You selling them?" There was a covert sneer in his tone. 

"No, no!" said the other quickly, "I'm giving them away for a promise. You see, I had an accident and one of my eyes was put out a while ago. Ofcourse, they wouldn't take me for a soldier, and the next best thing wasto be all the help I could to the fellows that are going to fight. Ifigure that book is the best thing I can bring you. "

The manly simplicity of the boy held Cameron's gaze firmly fixed. 

"H'm! In what way?" Cameron was turning the leaves curiously, enjoyingthe silky fineness and the clear-cut print and soft leather binding. Lifein the barracks was so much in the rough that any bit of refinement wasdoubly appreciated. He liked the feel of the little book and had acurious longing to be its possessor. 

"Why, it gives you a pretty straight line on where we're all going, whatis expected of us, and how we're to be looked out for. It shows one howto know God and be ready to meet death if we have to. "

"What makes you think anyone can know God on this earth?" asked Cameronsharply. 

"Because _I_ have, " said the astonishing young man quite as if he weresaying he were related to the President or something like that. 

"You have! How did you get to know Him?"

"Through that little book and by following its teachings. "

Cameron turned over the pages again, catching familiar phrases here andthere as he had heard them sometimes in Sunday school years ago. 

"You said something about a promise. What was it?"

"That you'll carry the book with you always, and read at least a verse init every day. "

"Well, that doesn't sound hard, " mused Cameron. "I guess I could standfor that. "

"The book is yours, then. Would you like to put your name to thatacceptance card in the front of the book?"

"What's that?" asked Cameron sharply as if he had discovered the fly inthe ointment for which he had all along been suspicious. 

"Well, I call it the first step in knowing God. It's your act ofacceptance of the way God has planned for you to be forgiven and savedfrom sin. If you sign that you say you will accept Christ as yourSaviour. "

"But suppose you don't believe in Christ? I can't commit myself toanything like that till I know about it?"

"Well, you see, that's the first move in getting to know God, " said thestranger with a smile. "God says he wants you to believe in his Son. Heasks that much of you if you want to get to know Him. "

Cameron looked at him with bewildered interest. Was here a possibleanswer to the questions of his heart. Why did this curious boy have alight in his face that never came from earth or air? What was there abouthis simple earnestness that was so convincing?

Another crap game had started up on the other side of them. A musicallyinclined private was playing ragtime on the piano, and another was tryingto accompany him on the banjo. The air was hazier than ever. It seemedstrange to be talking of such things in these surroundings:

"Let's get out of here and walk!" said Cameron, "I'd like to understandwhat you mean. "

For two hours they tramped across the frozen ground and talked, arguingthis way and that, much drawn toward one another. At last in the solemnbackground of a wall of whispering pines that shut them away from thestark gray rows of barracks, Cameron took out his fountain pen and withhis foot on a prone log, opened the little book on his knee and wrote hisname and the date. Then he put it in his breast pocket with the solemnfeeling that he had taken some kind of a great step toward what his soulhad been longing to find. They knelt on the frozen ground beside that logand the stranger prayed simply as if he were talking to a friend. Thereafter that spot was hallowed ground to Cameron, to which he cameoften to think and to read his little book. 

That night he wrote to Ruth, telling in a shy way of his meeting with theTestament man and about the little book. After he had mailed the letterhe walked back again to the spot among the pines and standing therelooked up to the stars and somehow committed himself again to thecovenant he had signed in the little book. It was then that he decidedthat if he got home again after quarantine before he went over, he wouldunite with the church. Somehow the stranger's talk that afternoon hadcleared away his objections. On his way back to the barracks across theopen field, up through the woods and over the crest of the hill towardthe road as he walked thinking deeply, suddenly from down below on theroad a familiar voice floated up to him. He parted the branches of oakunderbrush that made a screen between him and the road and glanced downto get his bearings the better to avoid an unwelcome meeting. It wasinevitable when one came near Lieutenant Wainwright that he wouldoverhear some part of a conversation for he had a carrying voice which henever sought to restrain. 

"You're sure she's a girl with pep, are you? I don't want to bother withany other kind. All right. Tell her to wait for me in the Washingtonstation to-morrow evening at eight. I'll look for her at the right of theinformation booth. Tell her to wear a red carnation so I'll know her. I'll show her a good time, all right, if she's the right sort. I'll trustyou that she's a good looker!"

Cameron could not hear the response, but the two were standingsilhouetted against a distant light, and something in the attitude of theother man held his attention. For a moment he could not place him, thenit flashed across his mind that this was the soldier Chambers, who hadbeen the means of his missing the train at Chester on the memorableoccasion when Ruth Macdonald had saved the day. It struck him as astrange thing that these two enemies of his whom he would have supposedto be strangers to one another should be talking thus intimately. To makesure of the man's identity he waited until the two parted and Wainwrightwent his way, and then at a distance followed the other one until he wasquite certain. He walked back thoughtfully trying to make it out. HadWainwright then been at the bottom of his trouble that day? It began toseem quite possible. And how had Ruth Macdonald happened to be soopportunely present at the right moment? How had she happened to turndown that road, a road that was seldom used by people going to Baltimore?It was all very strange and had never been satisfactorily explained. Ruthhad evaded the question most plausibly every time he had brought it up. Could it be that Wainwright had told her of a plot against him and shehad reached out to help him? His heart leaped at the thought. Then atonce he was sure that Wainwright had never told her, unless perhaps hehad told some tale against him, and made him the butt of a great joke. Well, if he had she had cared enough to defend him and help him outwithout ever giving away the fact that she knew. But here, too, lay athorn to disturb him. Why had Ruth Macdonald not told him the plain truthif she knew? Was she trying to shield Harry Wainwright? Could she reallycare for that contemptible scoundrel?

The thought in all its phases tore his mind and kept him awake for hours, for the crux of the whole matter was that he was afraid that RuthMacdonald was going to marry Lieutenant Wainwright, and he knew that itwas not only for her sake, but for his also that he did not wantthis--that it was agony even to contemplate. 

He told himself, of course, that his interest was utterly unselfish. Thatshe was nothing to him but a friend and never would be, and that while itmight be hard to see her belong to some fine man and know he never mightbe more than a passing friend, still it would not be like seeing her tiedto a rotten unprincipled fellow like Wainwright. The queer part of it wasthat the word "rotten" in connection with his enemy played a great partin his thoughts that night. 

Somewhere in the watches of the night a memory came to him of thecovenant he had made that day and a vague wistful reaching of his heartafter the Christ to whom he was supposed to have surrendered his life. Hewondered if a Christ such as the stranger had claimed He had, would takean interest in the affairs of Ruth Macdonald. Surely, such a flower of agirl would be protected if there was protection for anyone! And somehowhe managed a queer little prayer for her, the first he had tried to putup. It helped him a little, and toward morning he fell asleep. 

A few days later in glancing through his newly acquired Testament he cameupon a verse which greatly troubled him for a time. His eye had caught itat random and somehow it lodged in his mind:

"Forbearing one another, and forgiving one another, if any man have aquarrel against any: even as Christ forgave you, so also do ye. "

Somehow the principle of that verse did not fit with his proud spirit. Hethought instantly of Wainwright's distasteful face and form. It seemed toloom before him with a smug triumphal sneer. His enmity toward the fellowhad been of years standing, and had been deepened many times byunforgetable acts. There was nothing about Wainwright to make one forgivehim. There was everything about him to make one want to punish him. Whenthe verse first confronted Cameron he felt a rising indignation thatthere had been so much as a connection in his thoughts with his quarrelwith Wainwright. Why, anybody that knew him knew Wainwright was wrong. God must think so, too. That verse might apply to little quarrels but notto his feeling about the way Wainwright had treated him ever since theywere children. That was not to be borne, of course. Those words he hadcalled Cameron's father! How they made his blood boil even now! No, hewould not forbear nor forgive Wainwright. God would not want him to doso. It was right he should be against him forever! Thus he dismissed thesuggestion and turned to the beginning of his testament, havingdetermined to find the Christ of whom the stranger had set him in search. 

On the flyleaf of the little book the stranger had written a few words:

 "And ye shall find me, when ye shall search for me with all your heart. "--Jeremiah xxix: 13. 

That meant no half-way business. He could understand that. Well, he waswilling to put himself into the search fully. He understood that it wasworth a whole-hearted search if one were really to find a God as areward. 

That night he wrote a letter to the minister in Bryne Haven asking for aninterview when next he was able to get leave from camp. In the meantimehe kept out of the way of Wainwright most adroitly, and found many waysto avoid a meeting. 

There had been three awful days when his "peach of a captain" about whomhe had spoken to Ruth, had been called away on some military errand andWainwright had been the commanding officer. They had been days of galland wormwood to Cameron, for his proud spirit could not bend to salutethe man whom he considered a scoundrel, and Wainwright took a finedelight in using his power over his enemy to the limit. If it had notbeen for the unexpected return of the captain a day earlier than planned, Cameron might have had to suffer humiliations far greater than he did. 

The bitterness between the two grew stronger, and Cameron went about withhis soul boiling with rage and rebellion. It was only when Ruth's letterscame that he forgot it all for a few minutes and lifted his thoughts tohigher things. 

XIII

It was a clear, crisp day in March with just a smell of Spring in theair, when Cameron finally united with the church. 

He had taken a long time to think about it. Quarantine had extendeditself away into February, and while his company had had its regulardrill and hard work, there had been no leave from camp, no going toY. M. C. A. Huts, and no visiting canteens. They had been shut up to thecompany of the members of their own barracks, and there were times whenthat palled upon Cameron to a distressing degree. Once when it had snowedfor three days, and rained on the top of it, and a chill wind had sweptinto the cracks and crannies of the barracks, and poured down from theventilators in the roofs. The old stoves were roaring their best to keepup good cheer, and the men lay on their cots in rows talking; tellingtheir vile stories, one after another, each to sound bigger than thelast, some mere lads boasting of wild orgies, and all finally driftinginto a chat on a sort of philosophy of the lowest ideals. Cameron lay onhis cot trying to sleep, for he had been on guard all night, and a letterfrom Ruth was in his inside pocket with a comfortable crackle, but thetalk that drifted about him penetrated even his army blankets when hedrew them up over his ears. 

The fellows had arrived at a point where a young lad from Texas hadstated with a drawl that all girls were more or less bad; that this talkof the high standards of womanhood was all bosh; that there was onestandard for men and women, yes, but it was man's standard, not woman's, as was written sometimes. White womanhood! Bah! There was no such thing!

In vain Cameron stuffed the blanket about his ears, resolutely shut hiseyes and tried to sleep. His very blood boiled in his veins. The letterin his pocket cried out to be exonerated from this wholesale blackening. Suddenly Cameron flung the blanket from him and sprang to his feet with asingle motion, a tall soldier with a white flame of wrath in his face, his eyes flashing with fire. They called him in friendly derision the"Silent Corporal" because he kept so much to himself, but now he blazedforth at them:

"You lie, Kelly! You know you do! The whole lot of you are liars! Youknow that rot you've been talking isn't true. You know that it's to coverup your own vile deeds and to excuse your own lustful passions that youtalk this way and try to persuade your hearts and consciences that youare no worse than the girls you have dishonored! But it isn't so and youknow it! There _are_ good women! There always have been and there alwayswill be! You, every one of you, know at least one. You are dishonoringyour mothers and your sisters when you talk that way. You are worse thanthe beasts you are going out to fight. That's the rotten stuff they areteaching. They call it Kultur! You'll never win out against them if yougo in that spirit, for it's their spirit and nothing more. You've got togo clean! If there's a God in heaven He's in this war, and it's got to bea clean war! And you've got to begin by thinking differently of women oryou're just as bad as the Huns!"

With that he seized his poncho, stamped out into the storm, and trampedfor two hours with a driving sleet in his face, his thoughts a fury ofholy anger against unholy things, and back of it all the feeling that hewas the knight of true womanhood. She had sent him forth and no man inhis presence should defile the thought of her. It was during that trampthat he had made up his mind to ally himself with God's people. Whetherit would do any good in the long run in his search for God or not, whether he even was sure he believed in God or not, he would do that muchif he were permitted. 

His interview with the minister had not made things much plainer. He hadbeen told that he would grow into things. That the church was theshepherd-fold of the soul, that he would be nurtured and taught, that byand by these doubts and fears would not trouble him. He did not quite seeit, how he was to be nurtured on the distant battlefield of France, butit was a mystical thing, anyway, and he accepted the statement and let itgo at that. One thing that stuck in his heart and troubled him deeply wasthe way the minister talked to him about love and fellowship with hisfellow men. As a general thing, Cameron had no trouble with hiscompanions in life, but there were one or two, notably Wainwright and ayoung captain friend of his at camp, named Wurtz, toward whom his enmityalmost amounted to hatred. 

He was not altogether sure that the ministers suggestion that he mightlove the sinner and hate the sin would hold good with regard toWainwright; but there had been only a brief time before the communionservice and he had had to let the matter go. His soul was filled with aholy uplifting as he stepped out from the pastor's study and followedinto the great church. 

It had startled him just a little to find so many people there. Incontemplating this act of allying himself with God he had always thoughtof it as being between himself and God, with perhaps the minister and anelder or two. He sat down in the place indicated for him much disturbedin spirit. It had always been an annoyance to him to be brought to thenotice of his fellow townsmen, and a man in uniform in these days wasmore than ever an object of interest. His troubled gaze was downwardduring the opening hymns and prayers. But when he came to stand and takehis vows he lifted his eyes, and there, off at one side where the seatsgrouped in a sort of transept, he caught a glimpse of Ruth Macdonaldstanding beside her tall Captain-cousin who was home for the day, andthere was a light in her eyes that steadied him and brought back thesolemnity of the moment once more. It thrilled him to think she wasthere. He had not realized before that this must be her church. In fact, he had not thought of it as being any church in particular, but as beinga part of the great church invisible to which all God's childrenbelonged. It had not occurred to him until that morning, either, that hismother might be hurt that he had not chosen her church. But when he spoketo her about it she shook her head and smiled. She was only glad of whathe was doing. There were no regrets. She was too broad minded to stopabout creeds. She was sitting there meekly over by the wall now, herhands folded quietly in her lap, tears of joy in her eyes. She, too, hadseen Ruth Macdonald and was glad, but she wondered who the tall captainby her side might be. 

It happened that Cameron was the only person uniting by confession atthat time, for the quarantine had held him beyond the time the pastor hadspoken of when so many were joining, and he stood alone, tall andhandsome in his uniform, and answered in a clear, deep voice: "I do, " "Iwill!" as the vows were put upon him one by one. Every word he meant fromhis heart, a longing for the God who alone could satisfy the longings ofhis soul. 

He thrilled with strange new enthusiasm as the congregation of churchmembers were finally called upon to rise and receive him into theirfellowship, and looking across he saw Ruth Macdonald again and hisbeloved Captain La Rue standing together while everybody sang:

 Blest be the tie that binds Our hearts in Christian love; The fellowship of kindred minds Is like to that above. 

But when the bread and the wine had been partaken of, the solemn prayerof dedication spoken, the beautiful service was over, and the rich tonesof the organ were swelling forth, he suddenly felt strange and shy amongall that crowd of people whom he knew by sight only. The elders and someof the other men and women shook hands with him, and he was trying toslip away and find his mother when a kindly hand was laid upon hisshoulder and there stood the captain with Ruth beside him, and a warmhand shake of welcome into the church. 

"I'm so glad, " he said, "that you have taken this step. You will neverregret it, Cameron. It is good that we can be of the same company here ifwe have failed in other ways. " Then turning to Ruth he said:

"I didn't tell you, did I, Ruth, that I've failed in trying to getCameron transferred to my division? I did everything I could, but they'veturned down my application flatly. It seems like stupidity to me, for itwas just the place for which he was most fitted, but I guess it's becausehe was too much of a man to stay in a quiet sector and do such work. Ifhe had been maimed or half blinded they might have considered him. Theyneed him in his present place, and I am the poorer for it. "

There was a glow in Ruth's eyes as she put her hand in Cameron's and saidsimply: "I'm glad you're one of us now, " that warmed his heart with agreat gladness. 

"I didn't know you were a member, " he said wonderingly. 

"Why, yes, I've been a member since I was fourteen, " she said, andsuddenly he felt that he had indeed come into a holy and blessedcommunion. If he had not yet found God, at least he was standing on thesame ground with one of his holy children. 

That was the last time he got home before he sailed. Shipping quarantinewas put on his company the very next week, the camp was closed tovisitors, and all passes annulled. The word came that they would be goingover in a few days, but still they lingered, till the days grew intothree weeks, and the Spring was fully upon them in all its beauty, touching even the bare camp with a fringe of greenness and a sprinkle ofwild bloom in the corners where the clearing had not been complete. 

Added to his other disappointments, a direful change had taken place atcamp. The "peach of a captain" had been raised to the rank of major andCaptain Wurtz had been put in his place. It seemed as if nothing worsecould be. 

The letters had been going back and forth rather often of late, andCameron had walked to the loneliest spot in the camp in the starlight andhad it out with himself. He knew now that Ruth Macdonald was the onlygirl in all the world to him. He also knew that there was not a chance ina thousand that he could ever be more to her than he now was. He knewthat the coming months held pain for him, and yet, he would not go backand undo this beautiful friendship, no, not for all the pain that mightcome. It was worth it, every bit. 

He had hoped to get one more trip home, and she had wanted to see thecamp, had said that perhaps when the weather got warmer she might rundown some day with his mother, but now the quarantine was on and that wasout of the question. He walked alone to the places he would have liked toshow her, and then with a sigh went to the telephone office and waitedtwo hours till he got a connection through to her house, just to tell herhow sorry he was that he could not come up as he had expected and takethat ride with her that she had promised in her last letter. Somehow itcomforted him to hear her voice. She had asked if there would be nolifting of the quarantine before they left, no opportunity to meet himsomewhere and say good-bye, and he promised that he would let her know ifany such chance came; but he had little hope, for company after companywere being sent away in the troop trains now, hour after hour, and hemight be taken any minute. 

Then one day he called her up and told her that the next Saturday andSunday the camp was to be thrown open to visitors, and if she could comedown with his mother he would meet them at the Hostess' House and theycould spend the day together. Ruth promptly accepted the invitation andpromised to arrange it all with his mother and take the first train downSaturday morning. After he had hung up the receiver and paid his bill hewalked away from the little telephone headquarters in a daze of joy. Shehad promised to come! For one whole day he would have her to himself! Shewas willing to come with his mother! Then as he passed the officers'headquarters it occurred to him that perhaps she had other interests incoming to camp than just to see him, and he frowned in the darkness andhis heart burned hot within him. What if they should meet Wainwright! Howthe day would be spoiled!

With this trouble on his mind he went quite early in the morning down asnear to the little trolley station as he could get, for since thequarantine had been put on no soldiers without a special pass wereallowed beyond a certain point, which was roped off about the trolleystation. Sadly, Cameron took his place in the front rank, and stood withfolded arms to wait. He knew he would have some time to stand before hecould look for his guests, but the crowd was always so great at the traintimes that it was well to get a good place early. So he stood and thoughthis sad thoughts, almost wishing he had not asked them to come, as herealized more and more what unpleasantness might arise in case Wainwrightshould find out who were his guests. He was sure that the lieutenant wasnot above sending him away on a foolish errand, or getting him into ahumiliating situation before his friends. 

As he stood thus going over the situation and trying to plan how he mightspirit his guests away to some pleasant spot where Wainwright would notbe likely to penetrate, he heard the pompous voice of the lieutenanthimself, and slipping behind a comrade turned his face away so that hewould not be recognized. 

"Yes, I got special leave for three days!" proclaimed the satisfiedvoice, and Cameron's heart bounded up so joyously that he would havealmost been willing then and there to put aside his vow not to salutehim, and throw his arms about his enemy. Going away for three days. Thatmeant two things! First that Wainwright would not have to be thought ofin making his plans, and second that they were evidently not going tomove before Wainwright got back. They surely would not have given himleave if the company was to be sent away that day. A third exultantthought followed; Wainwright was going home presumably to see Ruth andRuth would not be there! Perhaps, oh _perhaps_ he might be able topersuade her and his mother to stay over Sunday! He hardly dared to hope, however, for Ruth Macdonald might think it presumptuous in him to suggestit, and again she might wish to go home to meet Wainwright. And, too, where could they sleep if they did stay. It was hopeless, of course. Theywould have to go back to Baltimore or to Washington for the night andthat would be a hard jaunt. 

However, Ruth Macdonald had thought of such a possibility herself, andwhen she and Mrs. Cameron stepped down from the Philadelphia train at thesmall country station that had suddenly become an important point becauseof the great camp that had sprung up within a stone's throw of it, shelooked around enquiringly at the little cottage homes in sight and saidto her companion:

"Would it be very dreadful in us to discover if there is some place herewhere we could stay over night in case John's company does not go justyet and we find we would be allowed to see him again on Sunday?"

She knew by the sudden lighting of the mother's wistful face that she hadread aright the sighs half stifled that she had heard on the train whenthe mother had thought she was not noticing. 

"Oh, do you suppose we could stay?" The voice was full of yearning. 

"Well, we can find out, at least. Anyhow, I'm going in here to seewhether they would take us in case we could. It looks like a nice neatplace. "

Ruth pulled open the gate, ran up the steps of the pleasant porch shadedwith climbing roses, and knocked timidly at the open door. 

A broad, somewhat frowsy woman appeared and surveyed her coolly with thatapprising glance that a native often gives to a stranger; took in theelegant simplicity of her quiet expensive gown and hat, lingering with ajealous glance on the exquisite hand bag she carried, then repliedapathetically to Ruth's question:

"No, we're all full. We ain't got any room. You might try down to theSalvation Army Hut. They got a few rooms down there. It's just beenbuilt. They might take you in. It's down the road a piece, that greenbuilding to the right. You can't miss it. You'll see the sign. "

Ruth caught her breath, thanked her and hastened back to her companion. Salvation Army! That was eccentric, queer, but it would be perfectlyrespectable! Or would it? Would Aunt Rhoda disapprove very much? Somehowthe Salvation Army was associated in her mind with slums and drunkards. But, at least, they might be able to direct her to a respectable place. 

Mrs. Cameron, too, looked dubious. This having a society girl tochaperone was new business for her. She had never thought much about it, but somehow she would hardly have associated the Salvation Army with theMacdonald family in any way. She paused and looked doubtfully at theunpretentious little one-story building that stretched away capaciouslyand unostentatiously from the grassy roadside. 

"SALVATION ARMY" arose in bold inviting letters from the roof, and "IceCold Lemonade" beckoned from a sign on the neat screen door. Ruth was abit excited. 

"I'm going in!" she declared and stepped within the door, Mrs. Cameronfollowing half fearfully. 

The room which they entered was long and clean and pleasant. Simple whitecurtains draped the windows, many rush-bottomed big rocking chairs werescattered about, a long desk or table ran along one side of the room withwriting materials, a piano stood open with music on its rack, and shelvesof books and magazines filled the front wall. 

Beyond the piano were half a dozen little tables, white topped and readyfor a hungry guest. At the back a counter ran the width of the room, withsandwiches and pies under glass covers, and a bright coffee urn steamingsuggestively at one end. Behind it through an open door was a view of thekitchen, neat, handy, crude, but all quite clean, and through this doorstepped a sweet-faced woman, wiping her hands on her gingham apron andcoming toward them with a smile of welcome as if they were expectedguests. It was all so primitive, and yet there was something about itthat bore the dignity of refinement, and puzzled this girl from hersheltered home. She was almost embarrassed to make her enquiry, but thehearty response put her quite at her ease, as if she had asked a greatfavor of another lady in a time of stress:

"I'm so sorry, but our rooms are all taken, " the woman waved a slenderhand toward the long side of the room and Ruth noticed for the first timethat a low partition ran the length of the room at one side with doors. Mechanically she counted them, eight of them, neat, gray-painted doors. Could these be rooms? How interesting! She had a wild desire to seeinside them. Rooms! They were more like little stalls, for the partitionsdid not reach all the way to the ceiling. A vision of her own spaciousapartment at home came floating in vague contrast. Then one of the doorsopposite her opened as its occupant, a quiet little elderly woman, cameout, and she had a brief glimpse of the white curtained window, the whitedraped comfortable looking bed, a row of calico curtained hooks on thewall, and a speck of a wash stand with tin pitcher and basin in thecorner, all as clean and new as the rest of the place. She swiftlydecided to stay here if there was any chance. Another look at the sweetface of the presiding woman who was trying to make them understand howcrowded everything was, and how many mothers there were with sons whowere going that night or the next, and who wanted to be near them, determined her. She was saying there was just a chance in case a certainmother from Boston who had written her did not arrive at five o'clock:

"But we ought not to take a chance, " said Cameron's mother, looking atthe eager faced girl with a cautious wistfulness. "What could we do ifnight came and we had no place to stay?"

Ruth cast her eyes about. 

"Couldn't we sit in a couple of those rocking chairs all night?" sheasked eagerly. 

The Salvation Army woman laughed affectionately as if she had found akindred spirit:

"Why, dearie, I could give you a couple of cots out here in the diningroom if you didn't mind. I wouldn't have pillows, but I think I could getyou some blankets. "

"Then we'll stay, " said Ruth triumphantly before Mrs. Cameron couldprotest, and went away feeling that she had a new friend in the wisesweet Salvation Army woman. In five minutes more they were seated in thetrolley on their way into the camp. 

"I'm afraid your people would not like you to stay in such a place, "began Mrs. Cameron dubiously, though her eyes shone with a light thatbelied her words. 

"Nonsense!" said Ruth with a bewildering smile, "it is as clean as a pinand I'm very much excited about staying there. It will be an adventure. I've never known much about the Salvation Army before, except that theyare supposed to be very good people. "

"There might be some rough characters----"

"Well, I guess they can't hurt us with that good woman around, andanyhow, you're going to stay till your son goes!" laughingly declaredRuth. 

"Well, we'll see what John says, " said his mother with a sigh, "I can'tlet you do anything--questionable. "

"Please, Mrs. Cameron, " pleaded Ruth, "let us forget things like thatthis trip and just have a happy time. "

The mother smiled, sadly, wistfully, through a mist of tears. She couldnot help thinking how wonderful it would have been if there had been nowar and her dear boy could have had this sweet wholesome girl for afriend. 

XIV

The sun was shining gloriously when the two stepped from the trolley atthe little camp station and looked bewildered about them at the swarms ofuniforms and boyish faces, searching for their one. They walked throughthe long lane lined with soldiers, held back by the great rope andguarded by Military Police. Each crowding eager soldier had an air ofexpectancy upon him, a silence upon him that showed the realization ofthe parting that was soon to be. In many faces deep disappointment wasgrowing as the expected ones did not arrive. Ruth's throat was filledwith oppression and tears as she looked about and suddenly felt the gripof war, and realized that all these thousands were bearing thisbitterness of parting, perhaps forever. Death stalking up and down abattlefield, waiting to take his pick of them! This was the picture thatflashed before her shrinking eyes. 

It was almost like a solemn ceremony, this walking down the lane ofsilent waiting soldiers, to be claimed by their one. It seemed to bringthe two young people nearer in heart than they had ever been before, whenat the end of the line Cameron met them with a salute, kissed his mother, and then turned to Ruth and took her hand with an earnest grave look ofdeep pleasure in his eyes. 

He led them up under the big trees in front of the Hostess' House whileall around were hushed voices, and teary eyes. That first moment ofmeeting was the saddest and the quietest of the day with everybody, except the last parting hour when mute grief sat unchecked upon everyface, and no one stopped to notice if any man were watching, but justlived out his real heart self, and showed his mother or his sister or hissweetheart how much he loved and suffered. 

That was a day which all the little painted butterflies of temptationshould have been made to witness. There were no painted ladies comingthrough the gates that day. This was no time for friendships like that. Death was calling, and the deep realities of life stood out and demandedattention. 

The whole thing was unlike anything Ruth had ever witnessed before. Itwas a new world. It was as if the old conventions which had heretoforehedged her life were dropped like a garment revealing life as it reallywas, and every one walked unashamed, because the great sorrow and need ofall had obliterated the little petty rules of life, and small passionswere laid aside, while hearts throbbed in a common cause. 

He waited on them like a prince, seeming to anticipate every need, andsmooth every annoyance. He led them away from the throng to the quiethillside above the camp where spring had set her dainty foot-print. Hespread down his thick army blanket for them to sit upon and they heldsweet converse for an hour or two. He told them of camp life and what wasexpected to be when they started over, and when they reached the otherside. 

His mother was brave and sensible. Sometimes the tears would brim over atsome suggestion of what her boy was soon to bear or do, but she wore asmile as courageous and sweet as any saint could wear. The boy saw andgrew tender over it. A bird came and sang over their heads, and themoment was sweet with springing things and quiet with the broodingtenderness of parting that hung over the busy camp. Ruth had one awfulmoment of adjustment when she tried to think how her aunt Rhoda wouldlook if she could see her now; then she threw the whole thing to thewinds and resolved to enjoy the day. She saw that while the conventionsby which she had been reared were a good thing in general, perhaps, theycertainly were not meant to hamper or hinder the true and natural life ofthe heart, or, if they were, they were not _good_ things; and she enteredinto the moment with her full sympathy. Perhaps Aunt Rhoda would notunderstand, but the girl she had brought up knew that it was good to behere. Her aunt was away from home with an invalid friend on a short tripso there had been no one to question Ruth's movements when she decided torun down to Washington with a "friend from the Red Cross" andincidentally visit the camp a little while. 

He had them over the camp by and by, to the trenches and dummies, and allthe paraphernalia of war preparation. Then they went back to the Hostess'House and fell into line to get dinner. As Cameron stood looking down atRuth in the crowded line in the democratic way which was the only waythere was, it came over them both how strange and wonderful it was thatthey two who had seen each other so little in their lives and who hadcome from such widely separated social circles should be there togetherin that beautiful intimacy. It came to them both at once and flashed itsthought from one pair of eyes to the other and back again. Cameron lookeddeep into her thoughts then for a moment to find out if there was ashadow of mortification or dismay in her face; but though she flushedconsciously her sweet true eyes gave back only the pleasure she wasfeeling, and her real enjoyment of the day. Then instantly each of themfelt that another crisis had been passed in their friendship, anothersomething unseen and beautiful had happened that made this moment mostprecious--one never to be forgotten no matter what happened in thefuture, something they would not have missed for any other experience. 

It was Ruth who announced suddenly, late in the afternoon, during asilence in which each one was thinking how fast the day was going:

"Did you know that we were going to stay over Sunday?"

Cameron's face blazed with joyful light:

"Wonderful!" he said softly, "do you mean it? I've been trying to getcourage all day to suggest it, only I don't know of any place this sideof Washington or Baltimore where you can be comfortable, and I hate tothink of you hunting around a strange city late at night foraccommodations. If I could only get out to go with you----!"

"It isn't necessary, " said Ruth quickly, "we have our accommodations allarranged for. Your mother and I planned it all out before we came. Butare you sure we can get into camp to-morrow?"

"Yes, I'm almost certain we can get you passes by going up to officers'headquarters and applying. A fellow in our company told me this morninghe had permission for his mother and sister to come in to-morrow. And weare not likely to leave before Monday now, for this morning ourlieutenant went away and I heard him say he had a three days' leave. Theywouldn't have given him that if they expected to send us before he gotback, at least not unless they recalled him--they might do that. "

"Is that the lieutenant that you called a 'mess' the other day?" askedRuth with twinkling eyes. 

"Yes, " said Cameron turning a keen, startled glance at her, and wonderingwhat she would say if she knew it was Wainwright he meant. 

But she answered demurely:

"So he's away, is he? I'm glad. I was hoping he would be. "

"Why?" asked Cameron. 

"Oh, I thought he might be in the way, " she smiled, and changed thesubject, calling attention to the meadow lark who was trilling out hislittle ecstasy in the tall tree over their head. 

Cameron gave one glance at the bird and then brought his gaze back to thesweet upturned face beside him, his soul thrilling with the wonder of itthat she should be there with him!

"But you haven't told me where you have arranged to stay. Is it Baltimoreor Washington? I must look up your trains. I hope you will be able tostay as late as possible. They're not putting people out of camp untileight o'clock to-night. "

"Lovely!" said Ruth with the eagerness of a child. "Then we'll stay tillthe very last trolley. We're not going to either Baltimore or Washington. We're staying right near the camp entrance in that little town at thestation where we landed, I don't remember what you call it. We gotaccommodations this morning before we came into camp. "

"But where?" asked Cameron anxiously. "Are you sure it's respectable? I'mafraid there isn't any place there that would do at all. "

"Oh, yes there is, " said Ruth. "It's the Salvation Army 'Hut, ' theycalled it, but it looks more like a barracks, and there's the dearestlittle woman in charge!"

"John, I'm afraid it isn't the right thing to let her do it!" put in hismother anxiously. "I'm afraid her aunt wouldn't like it at all, and I'msure she won't be comfortable. "

"I shall _love_ it!" said Ruth happily, "and my aunt will never knowanything about it. As for comfort, I'll be as comfortable as you are, mydear lady, and I'm sure you wouldn't let comfort stand in the way ofbeing with your boy. " She smiled her sweet little triumph that broughttears to the eyes of the mother; and Cameron gave her a blinding look ofgratitude and adoration. So she carried her way. 

Cameron protested no more, but quietly enquired at the Hostess' House ifthe place was all right, and when he put them on the car at eight o'clockhe gave Ruth's hand a lingering pressure, and said in a low tone thatonly she could hear, with a look that carried its meaning to her heart:

"I shall never forget that you did this for my mother--and me!"

The two felt almost light-hearted in comparison to their fellowtravellers, because they had a short reprieve before they would have tosay good-bye. But Ruth sat looking about her, at the sad-eyed girls andwomen who had just parted from their husbands and sons and sweethearts, and who were most of them weeping, and felt anew the great burden of theuniversal sorrow upon her. She wondered how God could stand it. The oldhuman question that wonders how God can stand the great agonies of lifethat have to come to cure the world of its sin, and never wonders how Godcan stand the sin! She felt as if she must somehow find God and pleadwith Him not to do it, and again there came that longing to her soul, ifshe only knew God intimately! Cameron's question recurred to herthoughts, "_Could_ anyone on this earth know God? Had anyone ever knownHim? Would the Bible say anything about it?" She resolved to read itthrough and find out. 

The brief ride brought them suddenly into a new and to Ruth somewhatstartling environment. 

As they followed the grassy path from the station to their abiding placetwo little boys in full military uniform appeared out of the tall grassof the meadows, one as a private, the other as an officer. The smallprivate saluted the officer with precision and marched on, turning aftera few steps to call back, "Mother said we might sleep in the tentto-night! The rooms are all full. " The older boy gave a whoop of delightand bounded back toward the building with a most unofficer-like walk, andboth disappeared inside the door. A tiny khaki dog-tent was set up in thegrass by the back door, and in a moment more the two young soldiersemerged from the back door with blankets and disappeared under the brownroof with a zest that showed it was no hardship to them to camp out forthe night. 

There were lights in the long pleasant room, and people. Two soldierswith their girls were eating ice cream at the little tables, and aroundthe piano a group of officers and their wives was gathered singingragtime. Ruth's quick glance told her they were not the kind she caredfor, and--how could people who were about to part, perhaps forever, standthere and sing such abominable nonsense! Yet--perhaps it was their way ofbeing brave to the last. But she wished they would go. 

The sweet-faced woman of the morning was busy behind the counter andpresently she saw them and came forward:

"I'm sorry! I hoped there would be a room, but that woman from Bostoncame. I can only give you cots out here, if you don't mind. "

Mrs. Cameron looked around in a half-frightened manner, but Ruth smiledairily and said that would be all right. 

They settled down in the corner between the writing table and book caseand began to read, for it was obvious that they could not retire atpresent. 

The little boys came running through and the officers corralled them andclamored for them to sing. Without any coaxing they stood up together andsang, and their voices were sweet as birds as they piped out the words ofa popular song, one singing alto, the little one taking the high soprano. Ruth put down her book and listened, wondering at the lovely expressionson the two small faces. They made her think of the baby-seraphs inMichael Angelo's pictures. Presently they burst into a religious songwith as much gusto as they had sung the ragtime. They were utterlywithout self-consciousness, and sang with the fervor of a preacher. Yetthey were regular boys, for presently when they were released they wentto turning hand springs and had a rough and tumble scuffle in the cornertill their mother called them to order. 

In a few minutes more the noisy officers and their wives parted, the menstriding off into the night with a last word about the possibility ofunexpected orders coming, and a promise to wink a flash light out of thecar window as the troop train went by in case they went out that night. The wives went into one of the little stall-rooms and compared notesabout their own feelings and the probability of the ----Nth Divisionleaving before Monday. 

Then the head of the house appeared with a Bible under his arm humming ahymn. He cast a keen pleasant glance at the two strangers in the corner, and gave a cheery word to his wife in answer to her question:

"Yes, we had a great meeting to-night. A hundred and twenty men raisedtheir hands as wanting to decide for Christ, and two came forward to beprayed for. It was a blessed time. I wish the boys had been over there tosing. The meeting was in the big Y. M. C. A. Auditorium. Has Captain Hawleygone yet?"

"Not yet. " His wife's voice was lowered. She motioned toward one of theeight gray doors, and her husband nodded sadly. 

"He goes at midnight, you know. Poor little woman!"

Just then the door opened and a young soldier came out, followed by hiswife, looking little and pathetic with great dark hollows under her eyes, and a forced smile on her trembling lips. 

The soldier came over and took the hand of the Salvation Army woman:

"Well, I'm going out to-night, Mother. I want to thank you for all you'vedone for my little girl"--looking toward his wife--"and I won't forgetall the good things you've done for _me_, and the sermons you'vepreached; and when I get over there I'm going to try to live right andkeep all my promises. I want you to pray for me that I may be true. Ishall never cease to thank the Lord that I knew you two. "

The Salvationists shook hands earnestly with him, and promised to prayfor him, and then he turned to the children:

"Good-bye, Dicky, I shan't forget the songs you've sung. I'll hear themsometimes when I get over there in battle, and they'll help to keep metrue. "

But Dicky, not content with a hand shake swarmed up the leg and back ofhis tall friend as if he had been a tree, and whispered in a loudconfidential child-whisper:

"I'm a goin' to pray fer you, too, Cap'n Hawley. God bless you!"

The grown-up phrases on the childish lips amused Ruth. She watched thelittle boy as he lifted his beautiful serious face to the responsive lookof the stranger, and marvelled. Here was no parrot-like repetition ofword she had heard oft repeated by his elders; the boy was talking anative tongue, and speaking of things that were real to him. There was noassumption of godliness nor conceit, no holier-than-thou smirk about thechild. It was all sincere, as a boy would promise to speak to his ownfather about a friend's need. It touched Ruth and tears sprang to hereyes. 

All the doubts she had had about the respectability of the place hadvanished long ago. There might be all kinds of people coming and going, but there was a holy influence here which made it a refuge for anyone, and she felt quite safe about sleeping in the great barn-like room soopen. It was as if they had happened on some saint's abode and been madewelcome in their extremity. 

Presently, one by one the inmates of the rooms came in and retired. Thenthe cots were brought out and set up, little simple affairs of canvas andsteel rods, put together in a twinkling, and very inviting to the twoweary women after the long day. The cheery proprietor called out, "Mrs. Brown, haven't you an extra blanket in your room?" and a pleasant voiceresponded promptly, "Yes, do you want it?"

"Throw it over then, please. A couple of ladies hadn't any place to go. Anybody else got one?"

A great gray blanket came flying over the top of the partition, and downthe line another voice called: "I have one I don't need!" and a whiteblanket with pink stripes followed, both caught by the Salvationist, andspread upon the little cots. Then the lights were turned out one by oneand there in the shelter of the tall piano, curtained by the darkness thetwo lay down. 

Ruth was so interested in it all and so filled with the humor and thestrangeness of her situation that tired as she was she could not sleepfor a long time. 

The house settled slowly to quiet. The proprietor and his wife talkedcomfortably about the duties of the next day, called some directions tothe two boys in the puppy tent, soothed their mosquito bites with alotion and got them another blanket. The woman who helped in the kitchencomplained about not having enough supplies for morning, and thatcontingency was arranged for, all in a patient, earnest way and in thesame tone in which they talked about the meetings. They discussed theirown boy, evidently the brother of the small boys, who had apparently justsailed for France as a soldier a few days before, and whom the wife hadgone to New York to see off, and they commended him to their Christ inlittle low sentences of reassurance to each other. Ruth could not helpbut hear much that was said, for the rooms were all open to sounds, andthese good people apparently had nothing to hide. They spoke as if alltheir household were one great family, equally interested in one another, equally suffering and patient in the necessities of this awful war. 

In another tiny room the Y. M. C. A. Man who had been the last to come intalked in low tones with his wife, telling her in tender, loving toneswhat to do about a number of things after he was gone. 

In a room quite near there were soft sounds as of suppressed weeping. Something made Ruth sure it was the mother who had been spoken of earlierin the evening as having come all the way from Texas and arrived too lateto bid her boy good-bye. 

Now and again the sound of a troop train stirred her heart to untolddepths. There is something so weird and sorrowful about its going, as ifthe very engine sympathized, screaming its sorrow through the night. Ruthfelt she never would forget that sound. Out there in the dark Cameronmight be even then slipping past them out into the great future. Shewished she could dare ask that sweet faced woman, or that dear little boyto pray for _him_. Maybe she would next day. 

The two officer's wives seemed to sit up in bed and watch the train. Theyhad discovered a flash light, and were counting the signals, and quiteexcited. Ruth's heart ached for them. It was a peculiarity of this tripthat she found her heart going out to others so much more than it hadever gone before. She was not thinking of her own pain, although she knewit was there, but of the pain of the world. 

Her body lying on the strange hard cot ached with weariness inunaccustomed places, yet she stretched and nestled upon the tan canvaswith satisfaction. She was sharing to a certain extent the hardships ofthe soldiers--the hardship of one soldier whose privations hurt herdeeply. It was good to have to suffer--with him. Where was God? Did Hecare? Was He in this queer little hostel? Might she ask Him now to set aguard over Cameron and let him find the help he needed wherewith to go tomeet Death, if Death he must meet?

She laid her hands together as a little child might do and with wide-openeyes staring into the dark of the high ceiling she whispered from herheart: "Oh God, help--_us_--to find _you_!" and unconsciously she, too, set her soul on the search that night. 

As she closed her eyes a great peace and sense of safety came over her. 

Outside on the road a company of late soldiers, coming home from leavenoised by. Some of them were drunk, and wrangling or singing, and a senseof their pitiful need of God came over her as she sank into a deep sleep. 

XV

She was awakened by the rattling of the pots and pans in the tinykitchen. She sat up startled and looked about her. It was very early. Thefirst sunlight was streaming redly through the window screens, and thefreshness of the morning was everywhere, for all the windows were wideopen. The stillness of the country, broken only by the joyous chorus ofthe birds, struck her as a wonderful thing. She lay down again and closedher eyes to listen. Music with the scent of clover! The cheery littlehome noises in the kitchen seemed a pleasant background for the peace ofthe Sabbath morning. It was so new and strange. Then came the thought ofcamp and the anticipation of the day, with the sharp pang at the memorythat perhaps even now Cameron was gone. Orders were so uncertain. In thearmy a man must be ready to move at a moment's notice. What if while sheslept he had passed by on one of those terrible troop trains!

She sat up again and began to put her hair into order and make herselfpresentable. He had promised that if such a thing as a sudden move shouldoccur he would throw out an old envelope with his name written on it asthey passed by the hut, and she meant to go out to that railroad trackand make a thorough search before the general public were up. 

Mrs. Cameron was still sleeping soundly, one work-worn hand partlyshading her face. Ruth knew instinctively that she must have been weepingin the night. In the early morning dawn she drooped on the hard littlecot in a crumpled heap, and the girl's heart ached for her sorrow. 

Ruth stole into the kitchen to ask for water to wash her face:

"I'm sorry, " said the pleasant-faced woman who was making coffee andfrying bacon, "but the wash basins are all gone; we've had so many folkscome in. But you can have this pail. I just got this water for myself andI'll let you have it and I'll get some more. You see, the water pipesaren't put in the building yet and we have to go down the road quite apiece to get any. This is all there was left last night. "

She handed Ruth a two-gallon galvanized tin bucket containing a couple ofinches of water, obviously clean, and added a brief towel to the toiletarrangements. 

Ruth beat a hasty retreat back to the shelter of the piano with hercollection, fearing lest mirth would get the better of her. She could nothelp thinking how her aunt would look if she could see her washing herface in this pittance of water in the bottom of the great big bucket. 

But Ruth Macdonald was adaptable in spite of her upbringing. She managedto make a most pleasing toilet in spite of the paucity of water, and thenwent back to the kitchen with the bucket. 

"If you will show me where you get the water I'll go for some more, " sheoffered, anxious for an excuse to get out and explore the track. 

The woman in the kitchen was not abashed at the offer. She accepted thesuggestion as a matter of course, taking for granted the same helpfulspirit that seemed to pervade all the people around the place. It did notseem to strike her as anything strange that this young woman should bewilling to go for water. She was not giving attention to details likeclothes and handbags, and neither wealth nor social station belonged toher scheme of life. So she smilingly gave the directions to the pump andwent on breaking nice brown eggs into a big yellow bowl. Ruth wished shecould stay and watch, it looked so interesting. 

She took the pail and slipped out the back door, but before she went insearch of water she hurried down to the railroad track and scanned it forseveral rods either way, carefully examining each bit of paper, herbreath held in suspense as she turned over an envelope or scrap of paper, lest it might bear his name. At last with a glad look backward to be sureshe had missed nothing, she hurried up the bank and took her way down thegrassy path toward the pump, satisfied that Cameron had not yet left thecamp. 

It was a lovely summer morning, and the quietness of the country struckher as never before. The wild roses shimmered along the roadside in theearly sun, and bees and butterflies were busy about their own affairs. Itseemed such a lovely world if it only had not been for _war_. How couldGod bear it! She lifted her eyes to the deep blue of the sky, wherelittle clouds floated lazily, like lovely aviators out for pleasure. WasGod up there? If she might only find Him. What did it all mean, anyway?Did He really care for individuals?

It was all such a new experience, the village pump, and the few earlystragglers watching her curiously from the station platform. A couple ofgrave soldiers hurried by, and the pang of what was to come shot throughher heart. The thought of the day was full of mingled joy and sorrow. 

They ate a simple little breakfast, good coffee, toast and fried eggs. Ruth wondered why it tasted so good amid such primitive surroundings; yeteverything was so clean and tidy, though coarse and plain. When they wentto pay their bill the proprietor said their beds would be onlytwenty-five cents apiece because they had had no pillow. If they had hada pillow he would have had to charge them fifty cents. The food wasfabulously cheap. They looked around and wondered how it could be done. It was obvious that no tips would be received, and that money was noconsideration. In fact, the man told them his orders were merely to payexpenses. He gave them a parting word of good cheer, and promised to tryand make them more comfortable if they wanted to return that night, andso they started out for camp. Ruth was silent and thoughtful. She waswishing she had had the boldness to ask this quaint Christian man some ofthe questions that troubled her. He looked as if he knew God, and shefelt as if he might be able to make some things plain to her. But herlife had been so hedged about by conventionalities that it seemed animpossible thing to her to open her lips on the subject to any livingbeing--unless it might be to John Cameron. It was queer how they two hadgrown together in the last few months. Why could they not have known oneanother before?

Then there came a vision of what her aunt might have thought, andpossible objections that might have come up if they had been intimatefriends earlier. In fact, that, too, seemed practically to have been animpossibility. How had the war torn away the veil from foolish laws ofsocial rank and station! Never again could she submit to much of thesystem that had been the foundation of her life so far. Somehow she mustfind a way to tear her spirit free from things that were not real. Thethought of the social activities that would face her at home under theguise of patriotism turned her soul sick with loathing. When she wentback home after he was gone she would find a way to do something real inthe world that would make for righteousness and peace somehow. Knittingand dancing with lonesome soldiers did not satisfy her. 

That was a wonderful day and they made the most of every hour, realizingthat it would probably be the last day they had together for many a longmonth or year. 

In the morning they stepped into the great auditorium and attended aY. M. C. A. Service for an hour, but their hearts were so full, and they allfelt so keenly that this day was to be the real farewell, and they couldnot spare a moment of it, that presently they slipped away to the quietof the woods once more, for it was hard to listen to the music and keepthe tears back. Mrs. Cameron especially found it impossible to keep hercomposure. 

Sunday afternoon she went into the Hostess' House to lie down in the restroom for a few minutes, and sent the two young people off for a walk bythemselves. 

Cameron took Ruth to the log in the woods and showed her his littleTestament and the covenant he had signed. Then they opened their heartstogether about the eternal things of life; shyly, at first, and then withthe assurance that sympathy brings. Cameron told her that he was tryingto find God, and Ruth told him about their experiences the night before. She also shyly promised that she would pray for him, although she hadseldom until lately done very much real praying for herself. 

It was a beautiful hour wherein they travelled miles in their friendship;an hour in which their souls came close while they sat on the log underthe trees with long silences in the intervals of their talk. 

It was whispered at the barracks that evening at five when Cameron wentback for "Retreat" that this was the last night. They would move in themorning surely, perhaps before. He hurried back to the Hostess' Housewhere he had left his guests to order the supper for all, feeling that hemust make the most of every minute. 

Passing the officers' headquarters he heard the raucous laugh ofWainwright, and caught a glimpse of his fat head and neck through awindow. His heart sank! Wainwright was back! Then he had been sent for, and they must be going that night!

He fled to the Hostess' House and was silent and distraught as he ate hissupper. Suppose Wainwright should come in while they were there and seeRuth and spoil those last few minutes together? The thought wasunbearable. 

Nobody wanted much supper and they wandered outside in the soft eveningair. There was a hushed sorrow over everything. Even the roughestsoldiers were not ashamed of tears. Little faded mothers clung to bigburly sons, and their sons smoothed their gray hair awkwardly and werenot ashamed. A pair of lovers sat at the foot of a tree hand in hand andno one looked at them, except in sympathy. There were partingseverywhere. A few wives with little children in their arms were writingdown hurried directions and receiving a bit of money; but most desolateof all was the row of lads lined up near the station whose friends weregone, or had not come at all, and who had to stand and endure the woe ofothers. 

"Couldn't we _walk_ out of camp?" asked Ruth suddenly. "Must we go onthat awful trolley? Last night everybody was weeping. I wanted to weep, too. It is only a few steps from the end of camp to our quarters. Or isit too far for you, Mrs. Cameron?"

"Nothing is too far to-night so I may be with my boy one hour longer. "

"Then we must start at once, " said Cameron, "there is barely time toreach the outskirts before the hour when all visitors must be out ofcamp. It is over three miles, mother. "

"I can walk it if Ruth can, " said the mother smiling bravely. 

He drew an arm of each within his own and started off, glad to be out ofWainwright's neighborhood, gladder still to have a little longer withthose he loved. 

Out through the deserted streets they passed, where empty barracks werebeing prepared for the next draft men; past the Tank Headquarters and thecolored barracks, the storehouses and more barracks just emptied thatafternoon into troop trains; out beyond the great laundry and on up thecinder road to the top of the hill and the end of the way. 

There at last, in sight of the Military Police, pacing back and forth atthe entrance to camp, with the twinkling lights of the village beyond, and the long wooded road winding back to camp, they paused to saygood-bye. The cinder path and the woods at its edge made a blot ofgreenish black against a brilliant stormy sky. The sun was setting like aball of fire behind the trees, and some strange freak of its rays formeda golden cross resting back against the clouds, its base buried among thewoods, its cross bar rising brilliant against the black of a thundercloud. 

"Look!" said Ruth, "it is an omen!" They looked and a great wonder andawe came upon them. The Cross!

Cameron looked back and then down at her and smiled. 

"It will lead you safely home, " she said softly and laid her hand in his. He held her fingers close for an instant and his eyes dared some of thethings his lips would never have spoken now even if they two had beenalone. 

The Military Police stepped up:

"You don't have to stay out here to say good-bye. You can come into thestation right here and sit down. Or if your friends are going to thevillage you may go with them, Comrade. I can trust you to come back rightaway. "

"I thank you!" Cameron said. "That is the kindest thing that has happenedto me at this camp. I wish I could avail myself of it, but I have barelytime to get back to the barracks within the hour given me. Perhaps--" andhe glanced anxiously across the road toward the village. "Could you justkeep an eye out that my ladies reach the Salvation Army Hut all right?"

"Sure!" said the big soldier heartily, "I'll go myself. I'm just goingoff duty and I'll see them safe to the door. "

He stepped a little away and gave an order to his men, and so they saidgood-bye and watched Cameron go down the road into the sunset with thegolden cross blazing above him as he walked lower and lower down the hillinto the shadow of the dark woods and the thunder cloud. But brightly thecross shone above him as long as they could see, and just before hestepped into the darkness where the road turned he paused, waved his hat, and so passed on out of their sight. 

XVI

The first night on the water was one of unspeakable horror to Cameron. They had scarcely begun to feel the roll of the waves before CaptainWurtz manifested his true nature. At six o'clock and broad daylight, heordered the men below, had them locked in, and all the port holes closed!

The place was packed, the heat was unbearable, the motion increasing allthe time, and the air soon became intolerable. In vain the men protested, and begged for air. Their requests were all denied. The captain trustedno man. He treated them as if they were hounds. Wainwright stood by thecaptain's side, smoking the inevitable cigarette, his eyes narrowlywatching Cameron, when the order was given; but no onlooker could havetold from Cameron's well trained face whether he had heard or not. Wellhe knew where those orders had originated, and instantly he saw a seriesof like torments. Wainwright had things in his own hands for this voyage. Wurtz was his devoted slave. For Wainwright had money, and used it freelywith his captain, and Wainwright well knew how to think up tortures. Itwas really the only thing in which he was clever. And here again was aninstance of practice making perfect, for Wainwright had done little elsesince his kindergarten days than to think up trials for those who wouldnot bow to his peevish will. He seemed to be gifted in finding outexactly what would be the finest kind of torture for any given soul whohappened to be his victim. He had the mind of Nero and the spirit of amean little beast. The wonder, the great miracle was, that he had not insome way discovered that Ruth had been visiting the camp, and taken hisrevenge before she left. This was the first thought that came to Cameronwhen he found himself shut into the murky atmosphere. The next thoughtwas that perhaps he had discovered it and this was the result. He felthimself the Jonah for the company, and as the dreadful hours went bywould fain have cast himself into the sea if there had been a possibleway of escape. 

It was not an American transport on which they were sailing, and thecaptain was not responsible for the food, but he might have refused toallow such meals to be served to his men if he had cared. He did notcare, that was the whole trouble. He ate and drank, principally drank, and did whatever Wainwright suggested. When a protest came up to him heturned it down with a laugh, and said: "Oh, that's good enough for a buckprivate, " and went on with his dirty jokes. 

The supper that first night was abominable, some unpleasant kind of meatcooked with cabbage, and though they tried to eat it, many of them couldnot keep it down. The ship rolled and the men grew sick. The atmospherebecame fetid. Each moment seemed more impossible than the last. There wasno room to move, neither could one get out and away. After supper the menlay down in the only place there was to lie, two men on the tables, twomen on the benches each side, two men on the floor between, and so on allover the cabin, packed like eggs in a box. 

They sent a message to their captain begging for air, but he onlylaughed, and sent word back they would have air enough before they gotthrough with this war. 

The night wore on and Cameron lay on his scant piece of floor--he hadgiven his bench to a sicker man than himself--and tried to sleep. Butsleep did not visit his eyelids. He was thinking, thinking. "I'm going tofind God! I'm going to search for Him with all my heart, and somehow I'mgoing to find Him before I'm done. I may never come home, but I'll findGod, anyhow! It's the only thing that makes life bearable!"

Then would come a wave of hate for his enemy and wipe out all otherthoughts, and he would wrestle in his heart with the desire to killWainwright--yes, and the captain, too. As some poor wretch near him wouldwrithe and groan in agony his rage would boil up anew, his fists wouldclench, and he would half rise to go to the door and overpower thatguard! If only he could get up to where the officers were enjoyingthemselves! Oh, to bring them down here and bind them in this loathsomeatmosphere, feed them with this food, stifle them in the dark with closedport holes! His brain was fertile with thoughts of revenge. Then suddenlyacross his memory would flash the words: "If with all your heart ye seekHim, " and he would reach out in longing: Oh, if he could find God, surelyGod would stop a thing like this! Did God have no power in His own earth?

Slowly, painfully, the days dragged by, each worse than the last. In themornings the men must go on deck whether they were sick or not, and muststay there all day, no matter what the weather. If they were wet theymust dry out by the heat of their bodies. There was no possibility ofgetting at their kit bags, it was so crowded. No man was allowed to openone. All they had was the little they carried in their packs. How theylived through it was a wonder, but live they did. Perhaps the worsttorture of all was the great round cork life preserver in the form of acushioned ring which they were obliged to wear night and day. A man couldnever lie down comfortably with it on, and if from sheer exhaustion hefell asleep he awoke with his back aching tortures. The meat and cabbagewas varied twice by steamed fish served in its scales, tails, fins, heads, and entrails complete. All that they got which was really eatablewas a small bun served in the morning, and boiled potatoes occasionally. 

Nevertheless, these hardships would have been as nothing to Cameron ifthey had not represented to him hate, pure and simple. He felt, andperhaps justly, that if Wainwright had not wished to make him suffer, these things would surely have been mitigated. 

The day came at last when they stood on the deck and watched the strangeforeign shore draw nearer. Cameron, stern and silent, stood apart fromthe rest. For the moment his anger toward Wainwright was forgotten, though he could hear the swaggering tones from the deck above, and thenoisome laughter of Wurtz in response. Cameron was looking into the faceof the future, wondering what it would mean for him. Out there was thestrange country. What did it hold for him? Was God there? How he wantedGod to go with him and help him face the future!

There was much delay in landing, and getting ready to move. The men wereweak from sickness and long fasting. They tottered as they stood, butthey had to stand--unless they dropped. They turned wan faces toward oneanother and tried to smile. Their fine American pep was gone, hopelessly, yet they grinned feebly now and then and got off a weak little joke ortwo. For the most part they glared when the officers came by--especiallytwo--those two. The wrath toward them had been brewing long and deep aseach man lay weltering through those unbearable nights. Hardship theycould bear, and pain, and sickness--but tyranny _never!_

Someone had written a letter. It was not the first. There had been otherson ship board protesting against their treatment. But this letter was awarning to that captain and lieutenant. If they ever led these men intobattle _they_ would be killed before the battle began. It was signed bythe company. It had been a unanimous vote. Now as they stood staringleadenly at the strange sights about them, listening to the new jargon ofthe shore, noting the quaint headdresses and wooden sabots of the peoplewith a fine scorn of indifference, they thought of that letter in hardphrases of rage. And bitterest of all were the thoughts of John Cameronas he stood in his place awaiting orders. 

They were hungry, these men, and unfit, when at last the order came tomarch, and they had to hike it straight up a hill with a great pack ontheir backs. It was not that they minded the packs or the hike or thehunger. It was the injustice of their treatment that weighed upon themlike a burden that human nature could not bear. They had come to liftsuch a burden from the backs of another nation, and they had been treatedlike dogs all the way over! Like the low rumbling of oncoming thunder wasthe blackness of their countenances as they marched up, up, and up intoBrest. The sun grew hot, and their knees wobbled under them from sheerweakness; strong men when they started, who were fine and fit, now faintlike babies, yet with spirits unbroken, and great vengeance in theirhearts. They would fight, oh they would fight, yes, but they would seethat captain out of the way first! Here and there by the way somefell--the wonder is they all did not--and had to be picked up by theambulances; and at last they had to be ordered to stop and rest! They!Who had come over here to flaunt their young strength in the face of theenemy! _They_ to fall _before the fight was begun_. This, too, they laidup against their tyrant. 

But there was welcome for them, nevertheless. Flowers and wreaths andbands of music met them as they went through the town, and women andlittle children flung them kisses and threw blossoms in their way. Thisrevived somewhat the drooping spirits with which they had gone forth, andwhen they reached camp and got a decent meal they felt better, and morereasonable. Still the bitterness was there, against those two who hadused their power unworthily. That night, lying on a hard little cot incamp Cameron tried to pray, his heart full of longing for God, yet foundthe heavens as brass, and could not find words to cry out, except inbitterness. Somehow he did not feel he was getting on at all in hissearch, and from sheer weariness and discouragement he fell asleep atlast. 

Three days and nights of rest they had and then were packed into tinyfreight cars with a space so small that they had to take turns sittingdown. Men had to sleep sitting or standing, or wherever they could findspace to lie down. So they started across France, three days and awfulnights they went, weary and sore and bitter still. But they had air andthey were better fed. Now and then they could stand up and look outthrough a crack. Once in a while a fellow could get space to stretch outfor a few minutes. Cameron awoke once and found feet all over him, feeteven in his face. Yet these things were what he had expected. He did notwhine. He was toughened for such experiences, so were the men about him. The hardness merely brought out their courage. They were getting theirspirits back now as they neared the real scene of action. The oldexcitement and call to action were creeping back into their blood. Nowand then a song would pipe out, or a much abused banjo or mandolin wouldtwang and bring forth their voices. It was only when an officer walked byor mention would be made of the captain or lieutenant that their looksgrew black again and they fell silent. Injustice and tyranny, the thingsthey had come out to fight, that they would not forgive nor forget. Theirspirits were reviving but their hate was there. 

At last they detrained and marched into a little town. 

This was France!

Cameron looked about him in dismay. A scramble of houses and barns, sortof two-in-one affairs. Where was the beauty of France about which he hadread so often? Mud was everywhere. The streets were deep with it, theground was sodden, rain-soaked. It was raining even then. Sunny France!

It was in a barnyard deep in manure where Cameron's tent was set up. Little brown tents set close together, their flies dovetailing so thatmore could be put in a given space. 

Dog weary he strode over the stakes that held them, and looked upon theplace where he was to sleep. Its floor was almost a foot deep in water!Rank, ill smelling water! Pah! Was this intention that he should havebeen billeted here? Some of the men had dry places. Of course, it mighthave just happened, but--well, what was the use. Here he must sleep forhe could not stand up any longer or he would fall over. So he heaped up apillow of the muck, spread his blanket out and lay down. At least hishead would be high enough out of the water so that he would not drown inhis sleep, and with his feet in water, and the cold ooze creeping slowlythrough his heavy garments, he dropped immediately into oblivion. Therewere no prayers that night. His heart was full of hate. The barnyard wasin front of an old stone farm house, and in that farm house were billetedthe captain and his favorite first lieutenant. Cameron could hear hisraucous laugh and the clinking of the wine glasses, almost the gurgle ofthe wine. The thought of Wainwright was his last conscious one before heslept. Was it of intention that he should have been put here close by, where Wainwright could watch his every move?

As the days went by and real training began, with French officers workingthem hard until they were ready to drop at night, gradually Cameron grewstolid. It seemed sometimes as if he had always been here, splashingalong in the mud, soaked with rain, sleeping in muck at night, neverquite dry, never free from cold and discomfort, never quite clean, alwaystraining, the boom of the battle afar, but never getting there. Where wasthe front? Why didn't they get there and fight and get done with it all?

The rain poured down, day after day. Ammunition trains rolled by. Moremen marched in, more marched on, still they trained. It seemed eons sincehe had bade Ruth and his mother good-bye that night at the camp. No mailhad come. Oh, if he could just hear a word from home! If he only had herpicture! They had taken some together at camp and she had promised tohave them developed and send them, but they would probably never reachhim. And it were better if they did not. Wainwright was censor. If herecognized the writing nothing would ever reach him he was sure. Still, Wainwright had nothing to do with the incoming mail, only the outgoing. Well, Wainwright should never censor his letters. He would find a way toget letters out that Wainwright had never censored, or he would neversend any. 

But the days dragged by in rain and mud and discouragement, and noletters came. Once or twice he attempted to write a respectable letter tohis mother, but he felt so hampered with the thought of Wainwright havingto see it that he kept it securely in his pocket, and contented himselfwith gay-pictured postcards which he had purchased in Brest, on which heinscribed a few non-committal sentences, always reminding them of thecensor, and his inability to say what he would, and always ending, "Remember me to my friend, and tell her I have forgotten nothing butcannot write at present for reasons which I cannot explain. "

At night he lay on his watery couch and composed long letters to Ruthwhich he dared not put on paper lest somehow they should come into thehands of Wainwright. He took great satisfaction in the fact that he hadsucceeded in slipping through a post card addressed to herself fromBrest, through the kindness and understanding of a small boy who agreedto mail it in exchange for a package of chewing gum. Here at the campthere was no such opportunity, but he would wait and watch for anotherchance. Meantime the long separation of miles, and the creeping days, gave him a feeling of desolation such as he had never experienced before. He began to grow introspective. He fancied that perhaps he hadoverestimated Ruth's friendship for him. The dear memories he hadcherished during the voyage were brought out in the nightwatches andruthlessly reviewed, until his own shy hope that the light in her eyeshad been for him began to fade, and in its place there grew a convictionthat happiness of earth was never for him. For, he reasoned, if shecared, why did she not write? At least a post card? Other fellows weregetting letters now and then. Day after day he waited when the mail wasdistributed, but nothing ever came. His mother seemed to have forgotten, too. Surely, all these weeks, some word would have come through. It wasnot in reason that his mail should be delayed beyond others. Could it bethat there was false play somehow? Was Wainwright at the bottom of this?Or had something happened to his mother, and had Ruth forgotten?

XVII

The weeks rolled by. The drilling went on. At last word came that thecompany was to move up farther toward the front. They prepared for a longhike almost eagerly, not knowing yet what was before them. Anything wasbetter than this intolerable waiting. 

Solemnly under a leaden sky they gathered; sullenly went through theirinspection; stolidly, dully, they marched away through the rain and mudand desolation. The nights were cold and their clothes seemed thin andinadequate. They had not been paid since they came over, so there was nochance to buy any little comfort, even if it had been for sale. A longingfor sweets and home puddings and pies haunted their waking hours as theytrudged wearily hour after hour, kilometer after kilometer, coming evernearer, nearer. 

For two days they hiked, and then entrained for a long uncomfortablenight, and all the time Cameron's soul was crying out within him for theliving God. In these days he read much in the little Testament wheneverthere was a rest by the wayside, and he could draw apart from the others. Ever his soul grew hungrier as he neared the front, and knew his time nowwas short. There were days when he had the feeling that he must stoptramping and do something about this great matter that hung over him, andthen Wainwright would pass by and cast a sharp direction at him with asneer in the curl of his moustache, and all the fury of his being wouldrise up, until he would clench his fists in helpless wrath, as Wainwrightswaggered on. To think how easily he could drag him in the dust if itonly came to a fair fight between them! But Wainwright had all theadvantage now, with such a captain on his side!

That night ride was a terrible experience. Cameron, with his thoughtssurging and pounding through his brain, was in no condition to come outof hardships fresh and fit. He was overcome with weariness when heclimbed into the box car with thirty-nine other fellows just as weary, just as discouraged, just as homesick. 

There was only room for about twenty to travel comfortably in that car, but they cheerfully huddled together and took their turns sitting down, and somewhere along in the night it came Cameron's turn to slide down onthe floor and stretch out for a while; or perhaps his utter wearinessmade him drop there involuntarily, because he could no longer keep awake. For a few minutes the delicious ache of lying flat enveloped him andcarried him away into unconsciousness with a lulling ecstasy. Thensuddenly Wainwright seemed to loom over him and demand that he rise andlet him lie down in his place. It seemed to Cameron that the lethargythat had stolen over him as he fell asleep was like heavy bags of sandtied to his hands and feet. He could not rise if he would. He thought hetried to tell Wainwright that he was unfair. He was an officer and hadbetter accommodations. What need had he to come back here and steal aweary private's sleep. But his lips refused to open and his throat gaveout no sound. Wainwright seemed gradually stooping nearer, nearer, with alarge soft hand about his throat, and his little pig eyes gleaming liketwo points of green light, his selfish mouth all pursed up as it used tobe when the fellows stole his all-day sucker, and held it tantalizinglyabove his reach. One of his large cushiony knees was upon Cameron's chestnow, and the breath was going from him. He gasped, and tried to shout tothe other fellows that this was the time to do away with this tyrant, this captain's pet, but still only a croak would come from his lips. Withone mighty effort he wrenched his hands and feet into action, and lungedup at the mighty bully above him, struggling, clutching wildly for histhroat, with but one thought in his dreaming brain, to kill--to kill!Sound came to his throat at last, action to his sleeping body, andstruggling himself loose from the two comrades who had fallen asleep uponhim and almost succeeded in smothering him, he gave a hoarse yell and gotto his feet. 

They cursed and laughed at him, and snuggled down good naturedly to theirbroken slumbers again, but Cameron stood in his corner, glaring out thetiny crack into the dark starless night that was whirling by, startledinto thoughtfulness. The dream had been so vivid that he could not easilyget rid of it. His heart was boiling hot with rage at his old enemy, yetsomething stronger was there, too, a great horror at himself. He had beenabout to kill a fellow creature! To what pass had he come!

And somewhere out in that black wet night, a sweet white face gleamed, with brown hair blown about it, and the mist of the storm in its locks. It was as if her spirit had followed him and been present in that dreamto shame him. Supposing the dream had been true, and he had actuallykilled Wainwright! For he knew by the wild beating of his heart, by thehotness of his wrath as he came awake, that nothing would have stayed hishand if he had been placed in such a situation. 

It was _like_ a dream to hover over a poor worn tempest-tossed soul inthat way and make itself verity; demand that he should live it out againand again and face the future that would have followed such a set ofcircumstances. He had to see Ruth's sad, stern face, the sorrowful eyesfull of tears, the reproach, the disappointment, the alien lifting of herchin. He knew her so well; could so easily conjecture what her wholeattitude would be, he thought. And then he must needs go on to think outonce more just what relation there might be between his enemy and thegirl he loved--think it out more carefully than he had ever let himselfdo before. All he knew about the two, how their home grounds adjoined, how their social set and standing and wealth was the same, how they hadoften been seen together; how Wainwright had boasted!

All night he stood and thought it out, glowering between the cracks ofthe car at the passing whirl, differentiating through the blackness nowand then a group of trees or buildings or a quick flash of furtive light, but mainly darkness and monotony. It was as if he were tied to the tailof a comet that dashed hellwards for a billion years, so long the nightextended till the dull gray dawn. There was no God anywhere in that darknight. He had forgotten about Him entirely. He was perhaps stronglyconscious of the devil at his right hand. 

They detrained and hiked across a bit of wet country that was allalike--all mud, in the dull light that grew only to accentuate theugliness and dreariness of everything. Sunny France! And this was sunnyFrance!

At last they halted along a muddy roadside and lined up for what seemedan interminable age, waiting for something, no one knew what, nor cared. They were beyond caring, most of them, poor boys! If their mothers hadappeared with a bowl of bread and milk and called them to bed they wouldhave wept in her arms with joy. They stood apathetically and waited, knowing that sometime after another interminable age had passed, the redtape necessary to move a large body like themselves would be unwound, andeverything go on again to another dreary halt somewhere. Would it ever beover? The long, long trail?

Cameron stood with the rest in a daze of discouragement, not taking thetrouble to think any more. His head was hot and his chest felt heavy, reminding him of Wainwright's fat knee; and he had an ugly cough. 

Suddenly someone--a comrade--touched him on the shoulder. 

"Come on in here, Cammie, you're all in. This is the Salvation Army Hut!"

Cameron turned. Salvation Army! It sounded like the bells of heaven. Ah!It was something he could think back to, that little Salvation Army Hutat camp! It brought the tears into his throat in a great lump. He lurchedafter his friend, and dropped into the chair where he was pushed, slidinghis arms out on the table before him and dropping his head quickly tohide his emotion. He couldn't think what was the matter with him. Heseemed to be all giving way. 

"He's all in!" he heard the voice of his friend, "I thought maybe youcould do something for him. He's a good old sport!"

Then a gentle hand touched his shoulder, lightly, like his mother's hand. It thrilled him and he lifted his bleared eyes and looked into the faceof a kindly gray-haired woman. 

She was not a handsome woman, though none of the boys would ever let herbe called homely, for they claimed her smile was so glorious that it gaveher precedence in beauty to the greatest belle on earth. There was a realmother lovelight in her eyes now when she looked at Cameron, and she helda cup of steaming hot coffee in her hand, real coffee with sugar andcream and a rich aroma that gave life to his sinking soul. 

"Here, son, drink this!" she said, holding the cup to his lips. 

He opened his lips eagerly and then remembered and drew back:

"No, " he said, drawing away, "I forgot, I haven't any money. We're alldead broke!" He tried to pull himself together and look like a man. 

But the coffee cup came close to his lips again and the rough motherlyhand stole about his shoulders to support him:

"That's all right!" she said in a low, matter-of-fact tone. "You don'tneed money here, son, you've got home, and I'm your mother to-night. Justdrink this and then come in there behind those boxes and lie down on mybed and get a wink of sleep. You'll be yourself again in a little while. That's it, son! You've hiked a long way. Now forget it and take comfort. "

So she soothed him till he surely must be dreaming again, and wonderedwhich was real, or if perhaps he had a fever and hallucinations. Hereached a furtive hand and felt of the pine table, and the chair on whichhe sat to make sure that he was awake, and then he looked into her kindgray eyes and smiled. 

She led him into the little improvised room behind the counter and tuckedhim up on her cot with a big warm blanket. 

"That's all right now, son, " she whispered, "don't you stir till you feellike it. I'll look after you and your friend will let you know if thereis any call for you. Just you rest. "

He thanked her with his eyes, too weary to speak a word, and so hedropped into a blessed sleep. 

When he awakened slowly to consciousness again there was a smell in theair of more coffee, delicious coffee. He wondered if it was the same cup, and this only another brief phase of his own peculiar state. Perhaps hehad not been asleep at all, but had only closed his eyes and opened themagain. But no, it was night, and there were candles lit beyond thebarricade of boxes. He could see their flicker through the cracks, andshadows were falling here and there grotesquely on the bit of canvas thatformed another wall. There was some other odor on the air, too. Hesniffed delightedly like a little child, something sweet and alluring, reminding one of the days when mother took the gingerbread and pies outof the oven. No--doughnuts, that was it! Doughnuts! Not doughnuts justbehind the trenches! How could that be?

He stirred and raised up on one elbow to look about him. 

There were two other cots in the room, arranged neatly with foldedblankets. A box in between held a few simple toilet articles, a tin basinand a bucket of water. He eyed them greedily. When had he had a goodwash. What luxury!

He dropped back on the cot and all at once became aware that there werestrange sounds in the air above the building in which he lay, strange anddeep, yet regular and with a certain booming monotony as if they had beengoing on a long time, and he had been too preoccupied to take notice ofthem. A queer frenzy seized his heart. This, then, was the sound ofbattle in the distance! He was here at the front at last! And that wasthe sound of enemy shells! How strange it seemed! How it gripped the soulwith the audacity of it all! How terrible, and yet how exciting to behere at last! And yet he had an unready feeling. Something was stillundone to prepare him for this ordeal. It was his subconscious self thatwas crying out for God. His material self had sensed the doughnuts thatwere frying so near to him, and he looked up eagerly to welcome whoeverwas coming tiptoing in to see if he was awake, with a nice hot plate ofthem for him to eat!

He swung to a sitting posture, and received them and the cup of hotchocolate that accompanied them with eagerness, like a little child whosemother had promised them if he would be good. Strange how easy andnatural it was to fall into the ways of this gracious household. Wouldone call it that? It seemed so like a home!

While he was eating, his buddy slipped in smiling excitedly:

"Great news, Cammie! We've got a new captain! And, oh boy! He's a peach!He sat on our louie first off! You oughtta have seen poor oldWainwright's face when he shut him up at the headquarters. Boy, you'd acroaked! It was rich!"

Cameron finished the last precious bite of his third hot doughnut with agulp of joy:

"What's become of Wurtz?" he asked anxiously. 

"Canned, I guess, " hazarded the private. "I did hear they took him to asanitarium, nervous breakdown, they said. I'll tell the world he'd havehad one for fair if he'd stayed with this outfit much longer. I only wishthey'd have taken his little pet along with him. This is no place forlittle Harold and he'll find it out now he's got a real captain. Good-night! How d'you 'spose he ever got his commission, anyway? Well, how are you, old top? Feelin' better? I knew they'd fix you up here. They're reg'ler guys! Well, I guess we better hit the hay. Come on, I'llshow you where your billet is. I looked out for a place with a goodwater-tight roof. What d'ye think of the orchestra Jerry is playing outthere on the front? Some noise, eh, what? Say, this little old hut issome good place to tie up to, eh, pard! I've seen 'em before, that's howI knew. "

During the days that followed Cameron spent most of his leisure time inthe Salvation Army Hut. 

He did not hover around the victrola as he would probably have doneseveral months before, nor yet often join his voice in the ragtime songthat was almost continuous at the piano, regardless of nearby shells, andusually accompanied by another tune on the victrola. He did not hoveraround the cooks and seek to make himself needful to them there, placinghimself at the seat of supplies and handy when he was hungry--as didmany. He sat at one of the far tables, often writing letters or readinghis little book, or more often looking off into space, seeing those lastdays at camp, and the faces of his mother and Ruth. 

There was more than one reason why he spent much of his time here. Thehut was not frequented much by officers, although they did comesometimes, and were always welcomed, but never deferred to. Wainwrightwould not be likely to be about and it was always a relief to feel freefrom the presence of his enemy. But gradually a third reason came to playa prominent part in bringing him here, and that was the atmosphere. Hesomehow felt as if he were among real people who were living lifeearnestly, as if the present were not all there was. 

There came a day when they were to move on up to the actual front. Cameron wrote letters, such as he had not dared to write before, for hehad found out that these women could get them to his people in caseanything should happen to him, and so he left a little letter for Ruthand one for his mother, and asked the woman with the gray eyes to getthem back home somehow. 

There was not much of moment in the letters. Even thus he dared not speakhis heart for the iron of Wainwright's poison had entered into his soul. He had begun to think that perhaps, in spite of all her friendliness, Ruth really belonged to another world, not his world. Yet just herfriendliness meant much to him in his great straight of loneliness. Hewould take that much of her, at least, even if it could never be more. Hewould leave a last word for her. If behind his written words there wasbreaking heart and tender love, she would never dream it. If his soul wasreally taking another farewell of her, what harm, since he said no sadword. Yet it did him good to write these letters and feel a reasonableassurance that they would sometime reach their destination. 

There was a meeting held that night in the hut. He had never happened toattend one before, although he had heard the boys say they enjoyed them. One of his comrades asked him to stay, and a quick glance told him thefellow needed him, had chosen him for moral support. 

So Cameron sat in a shadowy corner of the crowded room, and listened tothe singing, wild and strong, and with no hint of coming battle in itsfull rolling lilt. He noted with satisfaction how the "Long, Long Trail, "and "Pack Up Your Troubles in Your Old Kit Bag" gradually gave place to"Tell Mother I'll Be There, " and "When the Roll is Called Up Yonder, "growing strong and full and solemn in the grand old melody of "Abide WithMe. " There were fellows there who but a few hours before had beenshooting crap, whose lips had been loud with cheerful curses. Now theysat and sang with all their hearts, the heartiest of the lot. It was acurious psychological study to watch them. Some of them were just as keennow on the religious side of their natures as they had been with theirsport or their curses. Theirs were primitive natures, easily wrought uponby the atmosphere of the moment, easily impressed by the solemnity of thehour, nearer, perhaps, to stopping to think about God and eternity thanever before in their lives. But there were also others here, thoughtfulfellows who were strong and brave, who had done their duty and bornetheir hardships with the best, yet whose faces now were solemn withearnestness, to whom this meeting meant a last sacrament before theypassed to meet their test. Cameron felt his heart in perfect sympathywith the gathering, and when the singing stopped for a few minutes andthe clear voice of a young girl began to pray, he bowed his head with asmart of tears in his eyes. She was a girl who had just arrived that day, and she reminded him of Ruth. She had pansy-blue eyes and long goldripples in her abundant hair. It soothed him like a gentle hand on hisheart to hear her speak those words of prayer to God, praying for themall as if they were her own brothers, praying as if she understood justhow they felt this night before they went on their way. She was so youngand gently cared for, this girl with her plain soldier's uniform, and herfearlessness, praying as composedly out there under fire as if shetrusted perfectly that her heavenly Father had control of everything andwould do the best for them all. What a wonderful girl! Or, no--was itperhaps a wonderful trust? Stay, was it not perhaps a wonderful heavenlyFather? And she had found Him? Perhaps she could tell him the way and howhe had missed it in his search!

With this thought in his mind he lingered as the most of the rest passedout, and turning he noticed that the man who had come with him lingeredalso, and edged up to the front where the lassie stood talking with agroup of men. 

Then one of the group spoke up boldly:

"Say, Cap, " he addressed her almost reverently, as if he had called hersome queenly name instead of captain, "say, Cap, I want to ask you aquestion. Some of those fellows that preached to us have been telling usthat if we go over there, and don't come back it'll be all right with us, just because we died fighting for liberty. But we don't believe thatdope. Why--d'ye mean to tell me, Cap, that if a fellow has been rottenall his life he gets saved just because he happened to get shot in abattle? Why some of us didn't even come over here to fight because wewanted to; we had to, we were drafted. Do you mean to tell me that makesit all right over here? I can't see that at all. And we want to know thetruth. You dope it out for us, Cap. "

The young captain lassie slowly shook her head:

"No, just dying doesn't save you, son. " There was a note of tenderness inthat "son" as those Salvation Army lassies spoke it, that put theminfinitely above the common young girl, as if some angelic touch had setthem apart for their holy ministry. It was as if God were using theirlips and eyes and spirits to speak to these, his children, in theirtrying hour. 

"You see, it's this way. Everybody has sinned, and the penalty of sin isdeath. You all know that?"

Her eyes searched their faces, and appealed to the truth hidden in thedepths of their souls. They nodded, those boys who were going out soon toface death. They were willing to tell her that they acknowledged theirsins. They did not mind if they said it before each other. They meant itnow. Yes, they were sinners and it was because they knew they were thatthey wanted to know what chances they stood in the other world. 

"But God loved us all so much that He wanted to make a way for us toescape the punishment, " went on the sweet steady voice, seeming to bringthe very love of the Father down into their midst with its forceful, convincing tone. "And so He sent His son, Jesus Christ, to take our placeand die on the Cross in our stead. Whoever is willing to accept Hisatonement may be saved. And it's all up to us whether we will take it ornot. It isn't anything we can do or be. It is just taking Jesus as ourSaviour, believing in Him, and taking Him at His word. "

Cameron lingered and knelt with the rest when she prayed again for them, and in his own heart he echoed the prayer of acceptance that others wereputting up. As he went out into the black night, and later, on the silentmarch through the dark, he was turning it over in his mind. It seemed tohim the simplest, the most sensible explanation of the plan of Salvationhe had ever heard. He wondered if the minister at home knew all this andhad meant it when he tried to explain. But no, that minister had nottried to explain, he had told him he would grow into it, and here he wasperhaps almost at the end and he had not grown into it yet. That younggirl to-night had said it took only an instant to settle the whole thing, and she looked as if her soul was resting on it. Why could he not getpeace? Why could he not find God?

Then out of the dark and into his thoughts came a curse and a sneer and acurt rebuke from Wainwright, and all his holy and beautiful thoughtsfled! He longed to lunge out of the dark and spring upon that fat, flabbylieutenant, and throttle him. So, in bitterness of spirit he marched outto face the foe. 

XVIII

When Ruth Macdonald got back from camp she found herself utterlydissatisfied with her old life. The girls in her social set were full ofwar plans. They had one and all enlisted in every activity that wasgoing. Each one appeared in some pretty and appropriate uniform, and tookthe new régime with as much eagerness and enthusiasm as ever she had putinto dancing and dressing. 

Not that they had given up either of those employments. Oh, dear no! Whenthey were not busy getting up little dances for the poor dear soldierboys from the nearby camps, they were learning new solo steps wherewithto entertain those soldier boys when their turn came to go to camp andkeep up the continuous performance that seemed to be necessary to thecheering of a good soldier. And as for dressing, no one need ever suggestagain a uniform for women as the solution of the high cost of dressing. The number of dainty devices of gold braid and red stars and silvertassels that those same staid uniforms developed made plain forever thatthe woman who chooses can make even a uniform distinctive and strikingand altogether costly. In short they went into the war with the samesuperficial flightiness formerly employed in the social realms. They wentdashing here and there in their high-power cars on solemn errands, withall the nonchalance of their ignorance and youth, till one, knowing someof them well, trembled for the errand if it were important. And many ofthem were really useful, which only goes to prove that a tremendousamount of unsuspected power is wasted every year and that unskilled laboroften accomplishes almost as much as skilled. Some of them securedpositions in the Navy Yard, or in other public offices, where they werethrown delightfully into intimacies with officers, and were able to stepover the conventionalities of their own social positions into wildlyexciting Bohemian adventures under the popular guise of patriotism, without a rebuke from their elders. There was not a dull hour in thelittle town. The young men of their social set might all be gone to war, but there were others, and the whirl of life went on gaily for thethoughtless butterflies, who danced and knitted and drove motor cars, andmade bandages and just rejoiced to walk the streets knitting on theSabbath day, a gay cretonne knitting bag on arm, and knitting needlesplying industriously as if the world would go naked if they did not workevery minute. Just a horde of rebellious young creatures, who at heartenjoyed the unwonted privilege of breaking the Sabbath and shocking a fewfanatics, far more than they really cared to knit. But nobody had time topry into the quality of such patriotism. There were too many other peopledoing the same thing, and so it passed everywhere for the real thing, andthe world whirled on and tried to be gay to cover its deep heartache andstricken horror over the sacrifice of its sons. 

But Ruth, although she bravely tried for several weeks, could not throwherself into such things. She felt that they were only superficial. Theremight be a moiety of good in all these things, but they were not the realbig things of life; not the ways in which the vital help could be given, and she longed with her whole soul to get in on it somewhere. 

The first Sabbath after her return from camp she happened into a bit ofwork which while it was in no way connected with war work, still helpedto interest her deeply and keep her thinking along the lines that hadbeen started while she was with John Cameron. 

A quiet, shy, plain little woman, an old member of the church and notedfor good work, came hurrying down the aisle after the morning service andimplored a young girl in the pew just in front of Ruth to help her thatafternoon in an Italian Sunday school she was conducting in a smallsettlement about a mile and a half from Bryne Haven:

"It's only to play the hymns, Miss Emily, " she said. "Carrie Wayne has togo to a funeral. She always plays for me. I wouldn't ask you if I couldplay the least mite myself, but I can't. And the singing won't go at allwithout someone to play the piano. "

"Oh, I'm sorry, Mrs. Beck, but I really can't!" pleaded Miss Emilyquickly. "I promised to help out in the canteen work this afternoon. Youknow the troop trains are coming through, and Mrs. Martin wanted me totake her place all the afternoon. "

Mrs. Beck's face expressed dismay. She gave a hasty glance around therapidly emptying church. 

"Oh, dear, I don't know what I'll do!" she said. 

"Oh, let them do without singing for once, " suggested the carefree Emily. "Everybody ought to learn to do without something in war time. Weconserve sugar and flour, let the Italians conserve singing!" and with alaugh at her own brightness she hurried away. 

Ruth reached forward and touched the troubled little missionary on thearm:

"Would I do?" she asked. "I never played hymns much, but I could try. "

"Oh! Would you?" A flood of relief went over the woman's face, and Ruthwas instantly glad she had offered. She took Mrs. Beck down to thesettlement in her little runabout, and the afternoon's experience openeda new world to her. It was the first time she had ever come in contactwith the really poor and lowly of the earth, and she proved herself atrue child of God in that she did not shrink from them because many ofthem were dirty and poorly clad. Before the first afternoon was over shehad one baby in her arms and three others hanging about her chair withadoring glances. They could not talk in her language, but they staredinto her beautiful face with their great dark eyes, and spoke queerunintelligible words to one another about her. The whole little companywere delighted with the new "pretty lady" who had come among them. Theyopenly examined her simple lovely frock and hat and touched with shyfurtive fingers the blue ribbon that floated over the bench from hergirdle. Mrs. Beck was in the seventh heaven and begged her to come again, and Ruth, equally charmed, promised to go every Sunday. For it appearedthat the wayward pianist was very irregular and had to be constantlycoaxed. 

Ruth entered into the work with zest. She took the children's class whichformerly had been with the older ones, and gathering them about her toldthem Bible stories till their young eyes bulged with wonder and theirlittle hearts almost burst with love of her. Love God? Of course theywould. Try to please Jesus? Certainly, if "Mrs. Ruth, " as they calledher, said they should. They adored her. 

She fell into the habit of going down during the week and slipping intotheir homes with a big basket of bright flowers from her home gardenwhich she distributed to young and old. Even the men, when they happenedto be home from work, wanted the flowers, and touched them with eagerreverence. Somehow the little community of people so different fromherself filled her thoughts more and more. She began to be troubled thatsome of the men drank and beat their wives and little children inconsequence. She set herself to devise ways to keep them from it. Shescraped acquaintance with one or two of the older boys in her own churchand enlisted them to help her, and bought a moving picture machine whichshe took to the settlement. She spent hours attending moving pictureshows that she might find the right films for their use. Fortunately shehad money enough for all her schemes, and no one to hinder her good work, although Aunt Rhoda did object strenuously at first on the ground thatshe might "catch something. " But Ruth only smiled and said: "That's justwhat I'm out for, Auntie, dear! I want to catch them all, and try to makethem live better lives. Other people are going to France. I haven't got achance to go yet, but while I stay here I must do something. I can't bean idler. "

Aunt Rhoda looked at her quizzically. She wondered if Ruth was worriedabout one of her men friends--and which one?

"If you'd only take up some nice work for the Government, dear, such asthe other girls are doing!" she sighed, "work that would bring you intocontact with nice people! You always have to do something queer. I'm sureI don't know where you got your low tendencies!"

But Ruth would be off before more could be said. This was an old topic ofAunt Rhoda's and had been most fully discussed during the young years ofRuth's life, so that she did not care to enter into it further. 

But Ruth was not fully satisfied with just helping her Italians. The veryweek she came back from camp she had gone to their old family physicianwho held a high and responsible position in the medical world, and madeher plea:

"Daddy-Doctor, " she said, using her old childish name for him, "you'vegot to find a way for me to go over there and help the war. I know Idon't know much about nursing, but I'm sure I could learn. I've takencare of Grandpa and Auntie a great many times and watched the trainednurses, and I'm sure if Lalla Farrington and Bernice Brooks could getinto the Red Cross and go over in such a short time I'm as bright asthey. "

"Brighter!" said the old doctor eyeing her approvingly. "But what willyour people say?"

"They'll have to let me, Daddy-Doctor. Besides, everybody else is doingit, and you know that has great weight with Aunt Rhoda. "

"It's a hard life, child! You never saw much of pain and suffering andhorror. "

"Well, it's time, then. "

"But those men over there you would have to care for will not be likeyour grandfather and aunt. They will be dirty and bloody, and coveredwith filth and vermin. "

"Well, what of that!"

"Could you stand it?"

"So you think I'm a butterfly, too, do you, Daddy-Doctor? Well, I want toprove to you that I'm not. I've been doing my best to get used to dirtand distress. I washed a little sick Italian baby yesterday and helpedit's mother scrub her floor and make the house clean. "

"The dickens you did!" beamed the doctor proudly. "I always knew you hada lot of grit. I guess you've got the right stuff in you. But say, if Ihelp you you've got to tell me the real reason why you want to go, orelse--nothing doing! Understand? I know you aren't like the rest, justwanting to get into the excitement and meet a lot of officers and have agood time so you can say afterward you were there. You aren't that kindof a girl. What's the real reason you want to go? Have you got somebodyover there you're interested in?"

He looked at her keenly, with loving, anxious eyes as her father's friendwho had known her from birth might look. 

Ruth's face grew rosy, and her eyes dropped, but lifted again undaunted:

"And if I have, Daddy-Doctor, is there anything wrong about that?"

The doctor frowned:

"It isn't that fat chump of a Wainwright, is it? Because if it is Ishan't lift my finger to help you go. "

But Ruth's laugh rang out clear and free. 

"Never! dear friend, never! Set your mind at rest about him, " shefinished, sobering down. "And if I care for someone, Daddy-Doctor, can'tyou trust me I'd pick out someone who was all right?"

"I suppose so!" grumbled the doctor only half satisfied, "but girls areso dreadfully blind. "

"I think you'd like him, " she hazarded, her cheeks growing pinker, "thatis, you would if there _is_ anybody, " she corrected herself laughing. "But you see, it's a secret yet and maybe always will be. I'm not surethat he knows, and I'm not quite sure I know myself----"

"Oh, I see!" said the doctor watching her sweet face with a tenderjealousy in his eyes. "Well, I suppose I'll help you to go, but I'llshoot him, remember, if he doesn't turn out to be all right. It wouldtake a mighty superior person to be good enough for you, little girl. "

"That's just what he is, " said Ruth sweetly, and then rising and stoopingover him she dropped a kiss on the wavy silver lock of hair that hungover the doctor's forehead. 

"Thank you, Daddy-Doctor! I knew you would, " she said happily. "Andplease don't be too long about it. I'm in a great hurry. "

The doctor promised, of course. No one could resist Ruth when she waslike that, and in due time certain forces were set in operation to theend that she might have her desire. 

Meanwhile, as she waited, Ruth filled her days with thoughts of others, not forgetting Cameron's mother for whom she was always preparing somelittle surprise, a dainty gift, some fruit or flowers, a book that shethought might comfort and while away her loneliness, a restful ride atthe early evening, all the little things that a thoughtful daughter mightdo for a mother. And Cameron's mother wrote him long letters about it allwhich would have delighted his heart during those dreary days if theycould only have reached him then. 

Ruth's letters to Cameron were full of the things she was doing, full ofher sweet wise thoughts that seemed to be growing wiser every day. Shehad taken pictures of her Italian friends and introduced him to them oneby one. She had filled every page with little word pictures of her dailylife. It seemed a pity that he could not have had them just when heneeded them most. It would have filled her with dismay if she could haveknown the long wandering journey that was before those letters beforethey would finally reach him; she might have been discouraged fromwriting them. 

Little Mrs. Beck was suddenly sent for one Sunday morning to attend hersister who was very ill, and she hastily called Ruth over the telephoneand begged her to take her place at the Sunday school. Ruth promised tosecure some one to teach the lesson, but found to her dismay that no onewas willing to go at such short notice. And so, with trembling heart sheknelt for a hasty petition that God would guide her and show her how tolead these simple people in the worship of the day. 

As she stood before them trying to make plain in the broken, mixedItalian and English, the story of the blind man, which was the lesson forthe day, there came over her a sense of her great responsibility. Sheknew that these people trusted her and that what she told them they wouldbelieve, and her heart lifted itself in a sharp cry for help, for light, to give to them. She felt an appalling lack of knowledge and experienceherself. Where had she been all these young years of her life, and whathad she been doing that she had not learned the way of life so that shemight put it before them?

Before her sat a woman bowed with years, her face seamed with sorrow andhard work, and grimed with lack of care, a woman whose husband frequentlybeat her for attending Sunday school. There were four men on the backseat, hard workers, listening with eager eyes, assenting vigorously whenshe spoke of the sorrow on the earth. They, too, had seen trouble. Theysat there patient, sad-eyed, wistful; what could she show them out of theBook of God to bring a light of joy to their faces? There were littlechildren whose future looked so full of hard knocks and toil that itseemed a wonder they were willing to grow up knowing what was beforethem. The money that had smoothed her way thus far through life was notfor them. The comfortable home and food and raiment and light and luxurythat had made her life so full of ease were almost unknown to them. Hadshe anything better to offer them than mere earthly comforts whichprobably could never be theirs, no matter how hard they might strive?But, after all, money and ease could in no way soothe the pain of theheart, and she had come close enough already to these people to know theyhad each one his own heart's pain and sorrow to bear. There was one manwho had lost five little children by death. That death had come inconsequence of dirt and ignorance made it no easier to bear. The dirt andignorance had not all been his fault. People who were wiser and had notcared to help were to blame. What was the remedy for the world's sorrow, the world's need?

Ruth knew in a general way that Jesus Christ was the Saviour of theworld, that His name should be the remedy for evil; but how to put it tothem in simple form, ah! that was it. It was Cameron's search for God, and it seemed that all the world was on the same search. But now to-dayshe had suddenly come on some of the footprints of the Man of Sorrow asHe toiled over the mountains of earth searching for lost humanity, andher own heart echoed His love and sorrow for the world. She cried out inher helplessness for something to give to these wistful people. 

Somehow the prayer must have been answered, for the little congregationhung upon her words, and one old man with deep creases in his foreheadand kindly wrinkles around his eyes spoke out in meeting and said:

"I like God. I like Him good. I like Him all e time wi' mee! All e time. Ev'e where! Him live in my house!"

The tears sprang to her eyes with answering sympathy. Here in her littlemission she had found a brother soul, seeking after God. She had anotherswift vision then of what the kinship of the whole world meant, and howChrist could love everybody. 

After Sunday school was out little Sanda came stealing up to her:

"Mine brudder die, " she said sorrowfully. 

"What? Tony? The pretty fat baby? Oh, I'm so sorry!" said Ruth puttingher arm tenderly around the little girl. "Where is your mother? I must goand see her. "

Down the winding unkept road they walked, the delicately reared girl andthe little Italian drudge, to the hovel where the family were housed, atumbled-down affair of ancient stone, tawdrily washed over in some seasonpast with scaling pink whitewash. The noisy abode of the family pig wasin front of the house in the midst of a trim little garden of cabbage, lettuce, garlic, and tomatoes. But the dirty swarming little houseusually so full of noise and good cheer was tidy to-day, and no guestshovered on the brief front stoop sipping from a friendly bottle, orplaying the accordion. There was not an accordion heard in the community, for there had been a funeral that morning and every one was trying to bequiet out of respect for the bereaved parents. 

And there in the open doorway, in his shirt sleeves, crouched low uponthe step, sat the head of the house, his swarthy face bowed upon hisknees, a picture of utter despair, and just beyond the mother's head wasbowed upon her folded arms on the window seat, and thus they mourned inpublic silence before their little world. 

Ruth's heart went out to the two poor ignorant creatures in their griefas she remembered the little dark child with the brown curls and gloriouseyes who had resembled one of Raphael's cherubs, and thought how emptythe mother's arms would be without him. 

"Oh, Sanda, tell your mother how sorry I am!" she said to the littlegirl, for the mother could not speak or understand English. "Tell her notto mourn so terribly, dear. Tell her that the dear baby is safe and happywith Jesus! Tell her she will go to Him some day. "

And as the little girl interpreted her words, suddenly Ruth knew thatwhat she was speaking was truth, truth she might have heard before butnever recognized or realized till now. 

The mother lifted her sorrowful face all tear swollen and tried a pitifulsmile, nodded to say she understood, then dropped sobbing again upon thewindow sill. The father lifted a sad face, not too sober, but blear-eyedand pitiful, too, in his hopelessness, and nodded as if he accepted thefact she had told but it gave him no comfort, and then went back to hisown despair. 

Ruth turned away with aching heart, praying: "Oh, God, they need you!Come and comfort them. I don't know how!" But somehow, on her homewardway she seemed to have met and been greeted by her Saviour. 

It was so she received her baptism for the work that she was to do. 

The next day permission came for her to go to France, and she enteredupon her brief training. 

"Don't you dread to have her go?" asked a neighbor of Aunt Rhoda. 

"Oh, yes, " sighed the good lady comfortably, "but then she is going ingood company, and it isn't as if all the best people weren't doing it. Ofcourse, it will be great experience for her, and I wouldn't want to keepher out of it. She'll meet a great many nice people over there that shemight not have met if she had stayed at home. Everybody, they tell me, isat work over there. She'll be likely to meet the nobility. It isn't as ifwe didn't have friends there, too, who will be sure to invite her overweek ends. If she gets tired she can go to them, you know. And really, Iwas glad to have something come up to take her away from that miserablelittle country slum she has been so crazy about. I was dreadfully afraidshe would catch something there or else they would rob us and murder usand kidnap her some day. "

And that was the way things presented themselves to Aunt Rhoda!

XIX

All day the shells had been flying thick and fast. When night settleddown the fire was so continuous that one could trace the battle front bythe reflection in the sky. 

Cameron stood at his post under the stars and cried out in his soul forGod. For days now Death had stalked them very close. His comrades hadfallen all about him. There seemed to be no chance for safety. And wherewas God? Had He no part in all this Hell on earth? Did He not care? WouldHe not be found? All his seeking and praying and reading of the littlebook seemed to have brought God no nearer. He was going out pretty soon, in the natural order of the battle if things kept on, out into the otherlife, without having found the God who had promised that if he wouldbelieve, and if he would seek with all his heart he would surely findHim. 

Once in a Y. M. C. A. Hut on a Sunday night a great tenor came to entertainthem, and sang almost the very words that the stranger back in the Stateshad written in his little book:

 "If with, all your hearts ye truly seek Him ye shall ever surely find him. Thus saith your God!"

And ever since that song had rung its wonderful melody down deep in hisheart he had been seeking, seeking in all the ways he knew, with alonging that would not be satisfied. And yet he seemed to have foundnothing. 

So now as he walked silently beneath the stars, looking up, his soul wascrying out with the longing of despair to find a Saviour, the Christ ofhis soul. Amid all the shudderings of the battle-rent earth, theconcussions of the bursting shells, could even God hear a soul's low cry?

Suddenly out in the darkness in front of him there flickered a tinylight, only a speck of a glint it was, the spark of a cigarette, but itwas where it had no business to be, and it was Cameron's business to seethat it was not there. They had been given strict orders that there mustbe no lights and no sounds to give away their position. Even though histhoughts were with the stars in his search for God, his senses were keenand on the alert. He sprang instantly and silently, appearing before thedelinquent like a miracle. 

"Halt!" he said under his breath. "Can that cigarette!"

"I guess you don't know who I am!" swaggered a voice thick and unnaturalthat yet had a familiar sound. 

"It makes no difference who you are, you can't smoke on this post whileI'm on duty. Those are my orders!" and with a quick motion he caught thecigarette from the loose lips and extinguished it, grinding it into theground with his heel. 

"I'll--have you--c-c-co-marshalled fer this!" stuttered the angryofficer, stepping back unsteadily and raising his fist. 

In disgust Cameron turned his back and walked away. How had Wainwrightmanaged to bring liquor with him to the front? Something powerful andcondensed, no doubt, to steady his nerves in battle. Wainwright had everbeen noted for his cowardice. His breath was heavy with it. How could aman want to meet death in such a way? He turned to look again, andWainwright was walking unsteadily away across the line where they hadbeen forbidden to go, out into the open where the shells were flying. Cameron watched him for an instant with mingled feelings. To think hecalled himself a man, and dared to boast of marrying such a woman as RuthMacdonald. Well, what if he did go into danger and get killed! The worldwas better off without him! Cameron's heart was burning hot within him. His enemy was at last within his power. No one but himself had seenWainwright move off in that direction where was certain death within afew minutes. It was no part of his duty to stop him. He was not supposedto know he had been drinking. 

The whistle of a shell went ricocheting through the air and Camerondropped as he had been taught to do, but lifted his eyes in time to seeWainwright throw up his arms, drop on the edge of the hill, anddisappear. The shell plowed its way in a furrow a few feet away andCameron rose to his feet. Sharply, distinctly, in a brief lull of the dinabout him he heard his name called. It sounded from down the hill, a cryof distress, but it did not sound like Wainwright's voice:

"Cameron! Come! Help!"

He obeyed instantly, although, strange to say, he had no thought of itsbeing Wainwright. He crept cautiously out to the edge of the hill andlooked over. The blare of the heavens made objects below quite visible. He could see Wainwright huddled as he had fallen. While he looked theinjured man lifted his head, struggled to crawl feebly, but fell backagain. He felt a sense of relief that at last his enemy was where hecould do no more harm. Then, through the dim darkness he saw a figurecoming toward the prostrate form, and stooping over to touch him. Itshowed white against the darkness and it paid no heed to the shell thatsuddenly whistled overhead. It half lifted the head of the fallenofficer, and then straightened up and looked toward Cameron; and again, although there was no sound audible now in the din that the battle wasmaking, he felt himself called. 

A strange thrill of awe possessed him. Was that the Christ out there whomhe had been seeking? And what did he expect of him? To come out there tohis enemy? To the man who had been in many ways the curse of his younglife?

Suddenly as he still hesitated a verse from his Testament which had oftencome to his notice returned clearly to his mind:

"If thou bringest thy gift to the altar, and there rememberest that thybrother hath aught against thee, leave there thy gift before the altar. First be reconciled to thy brother, and then come and offer thy gift. "

Was this, then, what was required of him? Had his hate toward Wainwrightbeen what had hindered him from finding God?

There was no time now to argue that this man was not his brother. The manwould be killed certainly if he lay there many minutes. The opportunitywould pass as quickly as it had come. The Christ he sought was out thereexpecting him to come, and he must lose no time in going to Him. Howgladly would he have faced death to go to Him! But Wainwright! That wasdifferent! Could it be this that was required of him? Then back in hissoul there echoed the words: "If with all your heart ye truly seek. "Slowly he crept forward over the brow of the hill, and into the light, going toward that white figure above the huddled dark one; creepingpainfully, with bullets ripping up the earth about him. He was going tothe Christ, with all his heart--yes, all his heart! Even if it meantputting by his enmity forever!

Somewhere on the way he understood. 

When he reached the fallen man there was no white figure there, but hewas not surprised nor disappointed. The Christ was not there because hehad entered into his heart. He had found Him at last!

 * * * * *

Back at the base hospital they told Wainwright one day how Cameron hadcrawled with him on his back, out from under the searchlights amid theshells, and into safety. It was the only thing that saved his life, forif he had lain long with the wound he had got, there would have been nochance for him. Wainwright, when he heard it, lay thoughtful for a longtime, a puzzled, half-sullen look on his face. He saw that everybodyconsidered Cameron a hero. There was no getting away from that the restof his life. One could not in decency be an enemy of a man who had savedone's life. Cameron had won out in a final round. It would not be goodpolicy not to recognize it. It would be entirely too unpopular. He mustmake friends with him. It would be better to patronize him than to bepatronized by him. Perhaps also, down in the depths of his fat selfishheart there was a little bit of gratitude mixed with it all. For he _did_love life, and he _was_ a mortal coward. 

So he sent for Cameron one day, and Cameron came. He did not want tocome. He dreaded the interview worse than anything he had ever had toface before. But he came. He came with the same spirit he had gone outinto the shell-fire after Wainwright. Because he felt that the Christasked it of him. 

He stood stern and grave at the foot of the little hospital cot andlistened while Wainwright pompously thanked him, and told him graciouslythat now that he had saved his life he was going to put aside all the oldquarrels and be his friend. Cameron smiled sadly. There was no bitternessin his smile. Perhaps just the least fringe of amusement, but nohardness. He even took the bandaged hand that was offered as a token thatpeace had come between them who had so long been at war. All the timewere ringing in his heart the words: "With all your heart! With all yourheart!" He had the Christ, what else mattered?

Somehow Wainwright felt that he had not quite made the impression on thisstrong man that he had hoped, and in an impulse to be more than gracioushe reached his good hand under his pillow and brought forth an envelope. 

When Corporal Cameron saw the writing on that envelop he went white underthe tan of the battlefield, but he stood still and showed no other sign:

"When I get back home I'm going to be married, " said the complacentvoice, "and my wife and I will want you to come and take dinner with ussome day. I guess you know who the girl is. She lives in Bryne Haven upon the hill. Her name is Ruth Macdonald. I've just had a letter from her. I'll have to write her how you saved my life. She'll want to thank you, too. "

How could Cameron possibly know that that envelope addressed in RuthMacdonald's precious handwriting contained nothing but the briefest wordof thanks for an elaborate souvenir that Wainwright had sent her fromFrance?

"What's the matter with Cammie?" his comrades asked one another when hecame back to his company. "He looks as though he had lost his lastfriend. Did he care so much for that Wainwright guy that he saved? I'msure I don't see what he sees in him. I wouldn't have taken the troubleto go out after him, would you?"

Cameron's influence had been felt quietly among his company. In hispresence the men refrained from certain styles of conversation, when hesat apart and read his Testament they hushed their boisterous talk, andlately some had come to read with him. He was generally conceded to bethe bravest man in their company, and when a fellow had to die suddenlyhe liked Cameron to hold him in his arms. 

So far Cameron had not had a scratch, and the men had come to think hehad a charmed life. More than he knew he was beloved of them all. Morethan they knew their respect for him was deepening into a kind of awe. They felt he had a power with him that they understood not. He was stillthe silent corporal. He talked not at all of his new-found experience, yet it shone in his face in a mysterious light. Even after he came fromWainwright with that stricken look, there was above it all a glory behindhis eyes that not even that could change. For three days he went into thethick of the battle, moving from one hairbreadth escape to another withthe calmness of an angel who knows his life is not of earth, and on thefourth day there came the awful battle, the struggle for a position thathad been held by the enemy for four years, and that had been declaredimpregnable from the side of the Allies. 

The boys all fought bravely and many fell, but foremost of them allpassing unscathed from height to height, Corporal Cameron on the lead infearlessness and spirit; and when the tide at last was turned and theystood triumphant among the dead, and saw the enemy retiring in disorder, it was Cameron who was still in the forefront, his white face andtattered uniform catching the last rays of the setting sun. 

Later when the survivors had all come together one came to the captainwith a white face and anxious eyes:

"Captain, where's Cammie? We can't find him anywhere. "

"He came a half hour ago and volunteered to slip through the enemy'slines to-night and send us back a message, " he said in husky tones. 

"But, captain, he was wounded!"

"He was?" The captain looked up startled. "He said nothing about it!"

"He wouldn't, of course, " said the soldier. "He's that way. But he waswounded in the arm. I helped him bind it up. "

"How bad?"

"I don't know. He wouldn't let me look. He said he would attend to itwhen he got back. "

"Well, he's taken a wireless in his pocket and crept across No Man's Landto find out what the enemy is going to do. He's wearing a dead Jerry'suniform----!"

The captain turned and brushed the back of his hand across his eyes and alow sound between a sob and a whispered cheer went up from the gatheredremnant as they rendered homage to their comrade. 

 * * * * *

For three days the messages came floating in, telling vital secrets thatwere of vast strategic value. Then the messages ceased, and the anxiousofficers and comrades looked in vain for word. Two more dayspassed--three--and still no sign that showed that he was alive, and theword went forth "Missing!" and "Missing" he was proclaimed in thenewspapers at home. 

That night there was a lull in the sector where Cameron's company waslocated. No one could guess what was going on across the wide dark spacecalled No Man's Land. The captain sent anxious messages to otherofficers, and the men at the listening posts had no clue to give. It wasraining and a chill bias sleet that cut like knives was driving from thenortheast. Water trickled into the dugouts, and sopped through thetrenches, and the men shuddered their way along dark passages and waited. Only scattered artillery fire lit up the heavens here and there. It was anight when all hell seemed let loose to have its way with earth. Thewatch paced back and forth and prayed or cursed, and counted the minutestill his watch would be up. Across the blackness of No Man's Landpock-marked with great shell craters, there raged a tempest, and even aHun would turn his back and look the other way in such a storm. 

Slowly, oh so slow that not even the earth would know it was moving, there crept a dark creature forth from the enemy line. A thing all ofspirit could not have gone more invisibly. Lying like a stone asmotionless for spaces uncountable, stirring every muscle with acontrolled movement that could stop at any breath, lying under the verynose of the guard without being seen for long minutes, and gone when nexthe passed that way; slowly, painfully gaining ground, with a track ofblood where the stones were cruel, and a holding of breath when thefitful flare lights lit up the way; covered at times by mud from nearbybursting shells; faint and sick, but continuing to creep; chilled andsore and stiff, blinded and bleeding and torn, shell holes and stones andmiring mud, slippery and sharp and never ending, the long, longtrail----!

"Halt!" came a sharp, clear voice through the night. 

"Pat! Come here! What is that?" whispered the guard. "Now watch! I'm sureI saw it move----There! I'm going to it!"

"Better look out!" But he was off and back with something in his arms. Something in a ragged blood-soaked German uniform. 

They turned a shaded flash light into the face and looked:

"Pat, it's Cammie!" The guard was sobbing. 

At sound of the dear old name the inert mass roused to action. 

"Tell Cap--they're planning to slip away at five in the morning. Tell himif he wants to catch them he must do it _now_! Don't mind me! Go quick!"

The voice died away and the head dropped back. 

With a last wistful look Pat was off to the captain, but the guardgathered Cameron up in his arms tenderly and nursed him like a baby, crooning over him in the sleet and dark, till Pat came back with astretcher and some men who bore him to the dressing station lying inertbetween them. 

While men worked over his silent form his message was flashing toheadquarters and back over the lines to all the posts along that front. The time had come for the big drive. In a short time a great company ofdark forms stole forth across No Man's Land till they seemed like a widedark sea creeping on to engulf the enemy. 

Next morning the newspapers of the world set forth in monstrous type theglorious victory and how the Americans had stolen upon the enemy and cutthem off from the rest of their army, wiping out a whole salient. 

But while the world was rejoicing, John Cameron lay on his little hardstretcher in the tent and barely breathed. He had not opened his eyes norspoken again. 

XX

A nurse stepped up to the doctor's desk:

"A new girl is here ready for duty. Is there any special place you wanther put?" she asked in a low tone. 

The doctor looked up with a frown:

"One of those half-trained Americans, I suppose?" he growled. "Well, every little helps. I'd give a good deal for half a dozen fully trainednurses just now. Suppose you send her to relieve Miss Jennings. She can'tdo any harm to number twenty-nine. "

"Isn't there any hope for him?" the nurse asked, a shade of sadness inher eyes. 

"I'm afraid not!" said the doctor shortly. "He won't take any interest inliving, that's the trouble. He isn't dying of his wounds. Something istroubling him. But it's no use trying to find out what. He shuts up likea clam. "

The new nurse flushed outside the door as she heard herself discussed andshut her firm little lips in a determined way as she followed the headnurse down the long rows of cots to an alcove at the end where a screenshut the patient from view. 

Miss Jennings, a plain girl with tired eyes, gave a few directions andshe was left with her patient. She turned toward the cot and stopped witha soft gasp of recognition, her face growing white and set as she took inthe dear familiar outline of the fine young face before her. Every wordshe had heard outside the doctor's office rang distinctly in her ears. Hewas dying. He did not want to live. With another gasp that was like a sobshe slipped to her knees beside the cot, forgetful of her duties, of theward outside, or the possible return of the nurses, forgetful ofeverything but that he was there, her hero of the years!

She reached for one of his hands, the one that was not bandaged, and shelaid her soft cheek against it, and held her breath to listen. Perhapseven now behind that quiet face the spirit had departed beyond her grasp. 

There was no flutter of the eyelids even. She could not see that he stillbreathed, although his hand was not cold, and his face when she touchedit still seemed human. She drew closer in an agony of fear, and laid herlips against his cheek, and then her face softly, with one hand about hisother cheek. Her lips were close to his ear now. 

"John!" she whispered softly, "John! My dear knight!"

There was a quiver of the eyelids now, a faint hesitating sigh. Shetouched her lips to his and spoke his name again. A faint smile flickeredover his features as if he were seeing other worlds of beauty that had noconnection here. But still she continued to press her face against hischeek and whisper his name. 

At last he opened his eyes, with a bewildered, wondering gaze and sawher. The old dear smile broke forth:

"Ruth! You here? Is this--heaven?"

"Not yet, " she whispered softly. "But it's earth, and the war is over!I've come to help you get well and take you home! It's really you andyou're not 'Missing' any more. "

Then without any excuse at all she laid her lips on his forehead andkissed him. She had read her permit in his eyes. 

His well arm stole out and pressed her to him hungrily:

"It's--really you and you don't belong to anybody else?" he asked, anxiously searching her face for his answer. 

"Oh, John! I never did belong to anybody else but you. All my life eversince I was a little girl I've thought you were wonderful! Didn't youknow that? Didn't you see down at camp? I'm sure it was written all overmy face. "

His hand crept up and pressed her face close against his:

"Oh, my darling!" he breathed, "_my_ darling! The most wonderful girl inthe world!"

When the doctor and nurse pushed back the screen and entered the littlealcove the new nurse sat demurely at the foot of the cot, but a littlewhile later the voice of the patient rang out joyously:

"Doctor, how soon can I get out of this. I think I've stayed here aboutlong enough. "

The wondering doctor touched his patient's forehead, looked at himkeenly, felt his pulse with practised finger, and replied:

"I've been thinking you'd get to this spot pretty soon. Some beef tea, nurse, and make it good and strong. We've got to get this fellow on hisfeet pretty quick for I can see he's about done lying in bed. "

Then the wounds came in for attention, and Ruth stood bravely andwatched, quivering in her heart over the sight, yet never flinching inher outward calm. 

When the dressing of the wounds was over the doctor stood back andsurveyed his patient:

"Well, you're in pretty good shape now, and if you keep on you can leavehere in about a week. Thank fortune there isn't any more front to go backto! But now, if you don't mind I'd like to know what's made thismarvellous change in you?"

The light broke out on Cameron's face anew. He looked at the doctorsmiling, and then he looked at Ruth, and reached out his hand to gethers:

"You see, " he said, "I--we--Miss Macdonald's from my home town and----"

"I see, " said the doctor looking quizzically from one happy face to theother, "but hasn't she always been from your home town?"

Cameron twinkled with his old Irish grin:

"Always, " he said solemnly, "but, you see, she hasn't always been here. "

"I see, " said the doctor again looking quizzically into the sweet face ofthe girl, and doing reverence to her pure beauty with his gaze. "Icongratulate you, corporal, " he said, and then turning to Ruth he saidearnestly: "And you, too, Madame. He is a man if there ever was one. "

In the quiet evening when the wards were put to sleep and Ruth sat besidehis cot with her hand softly in his, Cameron opened his eyes from the naphe was supposed to be taking and looked at her with his bright smile. 

"I haven't told you the news, " he said softly. "I have found God. I foundHim out on the battlefield and He is great! It's all true! But you haveto search for Him with _all_ your heart, and not let any little old hateor anything else hinder you, or it doesn't do any good. "

Ruth, with her eyes shining, touched her lips softly to the back of hisbandaged hand that lay near her and whispered softly:

"I have found Him, too, dear. And I realize that He has been close besideme all the time, only my heart was so full of myself that I never saw Himbefore. But, oh, hasn't He been wonderful to us, and won't we have abeautiful time living for Him together the rest of our lives?"

Then the bandaged hand went out and folded her close, and Cameron utteredhis assent in words too sacred for other ears to hear.