G. B. Lancaster

“ One doesn't feel so much a man as a—a sort of perambulating obedience there. You get used to sitting or to lying in bed while a lady stands. Now—why, I'd no more take your tea than I'd take your seat! You see, the ladies of England——"
"I take no interest whatever in the ladies of England," said Dorothy.
She drank off the tea very much as Socrates must have drunk the hemlock, and retreated with determination to her fortifications. But Vera went shamelessly over to the enemy, sitting by him, fingering that gold stripe openly, and listening with rapt face to his low talk. ”

“ And you are not to accept lollies or fruit or anything from strangers. I was positively ashamed of you coming down. You even took that banana the Maori offered you, and you couldn't have been hungry—you'd been stuffing all day."
"I didn't want to hurt his feelings." Beneath the braided black hair Vera's rosy face shone with virtue. "Mum says we must always consider others."
"There are—limits." In Dorothy's mind Vera had overreached them long since. "A lady never allows liberties, especially when she's travelling without a man. You must learn to behave like a lady now you're past fourteen." ”

“ He looked again at Dorothy. "I say that if women would be more comradely and natural with men, there'd be a—a sight less of the false modesty and rottenness that we get tangled up in now. You girls are mighty clever with your Red Cross business when we're sick. When we're well, you either chuck yourselves at our heads or bite 'em off. I—— Why, here's Taihora! We only stop three minutes, but I'll get you some tea, Miss Cole."
He went out, carrying his head a little high. Dorothy walked back to her corner and took up a book with hands that shook a little. The bored girl began to whimper. ”

“ Then she bit her lips and read: "How little we understand ourselves!" said Adele sadly. "We are unusually weakest when we think ourselves most strong." Steeled by this reflection, she kept her eyes down while the train slouched up to an open platform in the bush and decided to rest there. Maoris with little rush baskets of fish and fruit came peering at the windows, and the gunner's voice cut suddenly through the weak protestations of the bored girl.
"But of course I did. I wired for it from the last stop. Lunch for four, and lashings of tea. It'll be ready. ”

“ Dorothy did not know. For a moment the paucity of her knowledge, as compared with his, abashed her. Then she snatched at her rights again. He might know much, this intolerable young man, but he had yet to learn what was due to womanhood; and since the ladies of England had apparently not been able to teach him, it was necessary that she should do so. She ate her salad with stately dignity, peeled her peaches with slim, dainty fingers, and replied in monosyllables dropped through prim, pretty lips. Soon the gunner ceased to talk to her ”

“ We'd sooner talk to ladies than to the vulgarer kind, many of us. But if all the old hidebound before-the-war conventions are going to hold—if girls and men haven't learnt to see some things a bit straighter—well, I guess it's going to be the worse for us, that's all. Good gracious! There are girls in the second-class carriages to-day—not so pretty as you, but heaps jollier—do you imagine I couldn't have given them all the tea and talk I'd wanted if I'd—wanted to?"
"A man should know how to behave, wherever he is." ”

“ But you don't know how jolly it feels to get back to yourself and wait on a lady again. Miss Cole"—he nodded towards the bored girl—"she understands. Tumbled to it at once, with just that delicate sort of instinct women have. You couldn't make a man understand with a club—unless he'd been through it. Have some more cake? Awfully nice she's been to me. I say, she isn't drinking her tea!" He lurched away with the tray as the train rounded a sharp elbow, and Dorothy heard him asking concerned questions. Vera was going off in suppressed explosions, and Dorothy dug frantic fingers into her knee. ”

“ With puzzled brows he glanced down at his sleeve and then back at her, and a perfect whirl of fury caught her up, so that she almost boxed his ears.
"Anyone but a cad would understand what I mean!" she cried, and, with a passionate gladness, she saw his face grow white.
"You mean," he said slowly, "that when a chap is half off his head with joy at getting home, he has to get girls who aren't particular to share it with him? Taking it all round, we soldiers have lived pretty much apart from ladies these three years, and now we want to talk to them, do you see? ”

“ In his crude masculine way he and such as he were calling to such as her for friendship and aid—calling to her to assume responsibilities unguessed at, undesired. She was furious and afraid. Did this young man imagine that war was going to mean the readjustment of more than the map of Europe? ”

“ The train has started, and he hasn't come back. He's just gone into a smoking-carriage for——"
The words died on Dorothy's mouth as the door opened and, battered, breathless, and beaming, the gunner arrived with three sloppy cups of tea.
"Best I could do." He dealt them out unhesitating. "Sorry there's no cake, but I nearly missed the 'bus completely. There were two dear old ladies further down who hadn't anyone to look after them, and by the time I'd got them fixed, there wasn't more than just time. But I was determined you should have some tea if I had to knock everyone in the buffet down." ”

“ She had to keep on being a nice girl. And that meant being reserved with strangers, allowing no liberties, encouraging no confidences. What business was it of hers if he—— Again her thoughts frayed out. She sat, flushed and angry, tapping her foot on the floor. He was unjust, wickedly unjust, impossible, absurd! Vera strolled back in search of lollies. She was whistling a bugle-call familiar enough throughout New Zealand now. Then she sang the words—
"Cock your eye at the maiden, chuck her under the chin! ”