Alice B. Emerson

“ She had read (who has not?) of the noble sacrifices of that great woman whose work for the 128 helpless soldiers in hospital antedates the Red Cross and its devoted workers—Florence Nightingale. She knew how the sick and dying soldiers in the Crimea kissed her shadow on their pillows as she passed their cots, and blessed her with their dying breaths.
The roughest soldier, wounded unto death, turns to the thought of mother, of wife, of sweetheart, of sister—indeed, turns to any good woman whose voice soothes him, whose hand cools the fever of his brow. ”

“ But Ruth had already heard the head physician of the hospital whisper to the nurse that Louis had no more than twenty-four hours to live. Yet the poilu’s sublime belief kept him cheerful to the end.
Many, many things the girl of the Red Mill was learning these days. If they did not exactly age her, she felt that she could never again take life so thoughtlessly and lightly. Her girlhood was behind her; she was facing the verities of existence. ”

“ Why had none of the German aviators dropped bombs upon the stone towers on the hill? Was it a fact that the enemy deliberately ignored the existence of the chateau—that somebody in that great pile of masonry won its immunity from German bombs by playing the traitor to France and her cause?
Charlie had really reduced the speed of the car until it was now only crawling up the slope 140 of the road. Something fluttered at the postern-gate—a woman’s petticoat.
“There’s the old woman,” said Charlie, “Take a good look at her.”
“You don’t mean the countess?” gasped Ruth. ”

“ Ruth Fielding began to understand better than ever before this particular work that she was now called upon to perform, and that she was so well fitted to perform.
She was cheerful as well as sympathetic; she was sane beyond most young girls in her management of men—many men.
“Bless you, Mademoiselle!” declared the matron, “of course they will make love to you. Let them. It will do them good—the poor blessés—and do you no harm. And you have a way with you!” ”

“ Ruth’s thoughts had never dwelt much upon love and marriage. She never looked on each man she met half-wonderingly as a possible husband. She had never met any man with this feeling. Perhaps, in part, that was, unconsciously to herself, because Tom had always been so a part of her life and her thoughts. Lately, however, she had come to the realization that if Tom should really ask her to marry him when his education was completed and he was established in the world, the girl of the Red Mill would be very likely to consider his offer seriously. ”

“ There was a flash following the explosion, and Uncle Jabez staggered back from the doorway, his arm across his eyes, while the gun dropped with a crash to the porch. The girls, as well as Aunt Alvirah, shrieked.
“I vum!” ejaculated the miller. “Who done that? What’s happened to Old Betsey?”
“Jabez Potter!” shrilled the little old woman, “didn’t I tell you to git rid o’ that gun long ago? Be you shot?”
“No,” said the miller grimly. “I’m only scare’t. Old Betsey never kicked like that afore.”
Ruth was at his side patting his shoulder and looking at him anxiously. ”

“ The hospital authorities could not get the citizens to clean up the town. What had been the custom for centuries must always be custom, they thought.
The grumbling of the big guns on the battlefront was almost continuous, day and night. It got so that Ruth forgot the sound. At night, from the narrow window of her cell, she could see the white glare over the trenches far away. By day black specks swinging to and fro in the air marked the observation balloons. Occasionally a darting airplane attracted her to the window of her workroom. ”

“ Mantel,” said Ruth Fielding gravely, “whether I speak and act as a lady should make little material difference in the long run. But whether a great organization, which is working for the amelioration of suffering on the battle front and in our training camps, is maligned, is of very great moment, indeed.
“In my presence no such statement as you have just made can go unchallenged. You must help me prove, or disprove it. We must find the girl and discover just how she came by the sweater. ”

“ Meanwhile Clair was shaken all through one day and night by increased artillery fire on the battle front. Never had Ruth Fielding heard the guns roll so terribly. It was as though a continuous thunderstorm shook the heavens and the earth.
The Germans tried to drive back the reserves behind the French trenches with the heaviest barrage fire thus far experienced along this sector, while they sent forward their shock troops to overcome the thin French line in the dugouts. ”

“ Sometimes papa says a word, and sometimes Tom; and the other nods and there is perfect understanding. It—it’s almost uncanny.”
“I think I know what you mean,” said the more observant girl of the Red Mill. “We grew up some time ago, Helen. And you know we have rather thought of Tom as a boy, still.
“But he is a man now. There is a difference in the sexes in their attitude to this war which should establish in all our minds that we are not equal.”
“Who aren’t equal?” demanded Helen, almost wrathfully, for she was a militant feminist.
“Men and women are not equal, dear. ”

“ The thought of her twin brother going to war had at first shocked and startled Helen. Now she added:
“For you know very well, Ruth Fielding, that Tom Cameron should not be allowed to go over there to France all alone.”
“Goodness, Helen!” gasped the girl of the Red Mill, “you don’t suppose that Tom is going to constitute an Army of Invasion in his own person, and attempt to whip the whole of Germany before the rest of Uncle Sam’s boys jump in?” 35
“You may laugh!” cried Helen. “He’s only a boy—and boys can’t get along without somebody to look out for them. ”

“ No more did she repeat slanders of the Red Cross, but was working for that organization.
Ruth Fielding would not forbid a person “seeing the light” and becoming converted to the worthiness of the cause; but somehow she could not take Mrs. Mantel and her work at their face value.
Gradually, as the weeks fled, Ruth became acquainted with others of the busy workers; with Mr. Charles Mayo, who governed this headquarters and seldom spoke of anything save the work—so she did not know whether he had a family, or social life, or anything else but just Red Cross. ”

“ It never makes a sound. Soldiers have shot at it, and either missed—or their bullets go right through it.”
“Oh, how absurd!”
“Isn’t it?” and perhaps Charlie Bragg grinned. But he went on seriously enough: “I don’t know. I’m only telling you what they say. If it is a white or gray dog, it leaps the very trenches and barbed-wire entanglements on the front—so they say. It has been seen doing so. No one has been able to shoot it. It crosses what they call No Man’s Land between the two battlefronts.”
“It carries despatches to the Germans, then!” cried Ruth. ”

“ Did you give your sweater to our local chapter?”
“Why—no. But what does that matter?” and the woman in black began to show anger. “Do you doubt my word?”
“You offer no corroborative evidence, and you make a very serious charge,” Ruth said. “Don’t be angry. If what you say is true, it is a terrible thing. Of course, there may be people using the name of the Red Cross who are neither patriotic nor honest. Let us run each of these seemingly wicked things down—if it is possible. Let us get at the truth.” ”

“ Ruth saw the professor when they landed. The Italian chef she did not see at all. Nor did Ruth Fielding see anybody who looked like Mrs. Rose Mantel.
“I may be quite wrong in all my suspicions,” she thought. “I would better say nothing about them. To cause the authorities to arrest entirely innocent people would be a very wicked thing, indeed.”
Besides, there was so much to do and to see that the girl of the Red Mill could not keep her suspicions alive. This unknown world she and her mates had come to quite filled their minds with new thoughts and interests. ”

“ No. I do not know him. There are many captains,” and Henriette laughed.
“He—he looks like somebody I know,” Ruth said hesitatingly. She did not wish to explain her sudden shocked feeling on seeing the man’s face. He looked like the shaven Legrand who, on the ship coming over and in Lyse, had called himself “Professor Perry.”
If this was the crook, who, Ruth believed, had set fire to the business office of the Robinsburg Red Cross headquarters, he had evidently not been arrested in connection with the supply department scandal, of which the matron of the hospital had told her. ”

“ Helen took her over in the car the next morning and was inclined to be tearful when they separated. 59
“Just does seem as though I couldn’t get on without you, Ruthie!” she cried.
“Why, you are worse than poor Aunt Alvirah! Every time I go away from home she acts as though I might never come back again. And as for you, Helen Cameron, you have plenty to do. You have my share of Red Cross work in Cheslow to do as well as your own. Don’t forget that.”
Headquarters was a busy place. The very things Ruth told Helen she could do, she did do—and a multitude besides. ”

“ Ruth fully understood that to find a person as capable as the woman already selected would not be an easy matter.
Until the hour the party left New York for Philadelphia, the port of sail for the Red Cross ship, no candidate had been settled on by the Commissioner to head the supply unit.
“We shall find somebody. I have one person in mind right now who may be the very one. If so, this person will be shipped by a faster vessel and by another convoy than yours,” and he laughed. “You may find your chief in Paris when you get there.” ”

“ Ruth added, remembering the glimpse she had caught of such a creature with Bessie at the chateau gate. 176
“Oh, it is such bad fortune to see it!” sighed Henriette.
“Don’t be so childish,” Ruth adjured, brusquely. “Nothing about that dog can hurt you. But I have an idea the poor creature may be doing the French cause harm.”
“Oh, Mademoiselle! You have heard the vile talk about the dear countess!” cried Henriette. “It is not so. She is a brave and lovely lady. She gives her all for France. She would be filled with horror if she knew anybody connected her with the spies of les Boches.” ”

“ Never before has war so soon and so suddenly offered womankind a chance to aid in an undying cause.
Yet Ruth did not neglect the small and seemingly unimportant duties right at hand. She was no dreamer or dallier. Having got off this big box of comforts for the boys at the front, the very next day she, with Helen, took up the effort already begun of a house-to-house campaign throughout Cheslow for Red Cross members, and 15 to invite the feminine part of the community to aid in a big drive for knitted goods. ”

“ That effort confined to the county in which Cheslow and the Red Mill were located had begun early; but it had gone stumblingly. Indeed, as Helen said, if it was a drive, it was about like driving home the cows!
Mr. Cameron had expected much of Ruth and his own daughter among the farming people; but they were actually behind the collectors who worked in the towns. It was at a time in the year when the men of the scattered communities were working hard out of doors; and it is difficult to interest farmers in anything but their crops during the growing season. ”

“ Cheslow and the vicinity of the Red Mill was not alone in this. Many, many communities were yet to be awakened.
Ruth bore these facts very much on her heart. She was doing all that she could to strike a note of alarm that should awaken Cheslow.
Despite Uncle Jabez Potter’s patriotism, she would have been afraid to tell him just how much she had personally subscribed for the work of the Red Cross and for other war activities. And, likewise, in her heart was another secret—a longing to be doing something of moment for the cause. She wanted to really enlist for the war! ”

“ It is a dog trained to run between the spy on this side and somebody behind the German lines. Poor dog!”
“Wow!” ejaculated the young fellow with disgust. “Isn’t that just like a girl? ‘Poor dog,’ indeed!”
“Why! you don’t suppose that a noble dog would want to be a spy?” cried Ruth. “You can scarcely imagine a dog choosing any tricky way through life. ”