Margaret Vandercook

“ Barbara was silent an instant. Then she answered slowly, as if she were thinking quietly concerning her husband’s statement:
“Yes, Dick, but you also are married and also have a baby and also are doing what you can to help with the Red Cross work and giving all and more than you can afford to the war work! Yet you are not content to let the other fellows do the fighting. Why, you have been trying to enlist ever since the United States entered the war and have been terribly discouraged because you were found to be not up to the physical standard.” ”

“ He had borne himself with a fine soldierly erectness, had been full of gayety and good humor and charm, one’s ideal of a French soldier and lover, for he and Eugenia had been married only lately.
Now he was Jeanne’s friend, but the pathos of him was beyond expression. Not in death, but in life one measures the tragedies of war.
However, the eyes, the shape of the head, even the figure itself, left no chance for doubting in either Nona’s or Barbara’s [185] consciousness, much as they would have preferred to doubt. ”

“ I realized all along that you would never allow the fact that the old trouble with your eyes would make you exempt from military service, to keep you at home when you know there is so much work to be done in beautiful wounded France that you are able to do. Your mother has been braver over your volunteering for ambulance work again than I have this time, dear. It is funny how being happy so often makes one selfish. I realized the difference between Nona Davis and me just this afternoon, and yet I was just as devoted to the Red Cross nursing as Nona, before I married you. ”

“ So that by and by, Mollie began to feel not only tired but almost exhausted. Yet she did not wish to interrupt the others nor to ask any one of them to return to the hospital with her.
She could overhear Eugenia talking to Agatha Burton and had seldom seen Agatha so animated or in earnest.
“No, I cannot tell you how many American troops have arrived in France. No one outside the government is informed. But in any case it would be impossible, as new contingents of soldiers are reaching France almost every day.” ”

“ Sonya treated him almost as she did Bianca, in a half maternal, half friendly fashion, and yet Barbara wondered if she felt in the same way toward them both. As Barbara had not seen the young Italian-American during the crossing to Italy, when he had seemed to be merely a crude, vain boy, she could not appreciate what Sonya’s influence had done for him. Barbara now saw a remarkably good looking young fellow of perhaps something over twenty, with dark eyes and hair, charming manners and an expression of quiet melancholy which his tragic loss rendered appealing. ”

“ I grow tired of hearing Madame Castaigne’s name. Of course I understand you can’t accept such a task. Please forget I asked you. The truth is, Nona—Miss Davis—I wish you could make up your mind to bear with me for longer than just this time of nursing. I know I only look like half a man with the other half in bandages, and I may be a boor and a bully, but you see I have never had a single woman’s affection in my life——”
Nona was by this time standing up looking very grave and angry. ”

“ She was like a slender yellow lily, as cold and as remote, which Jack Martin remembered growing in certain aristocratic gardens he had seen in the South.
“I am your nurse, Lieutenant Martin, if you wish me to continue to care for you, please never say anything of that character again, else you make my work impossible.”
Then to Nona’s intense relief she heard someone at the door with her patient’s dinner.
This was not her first experience of this kind. Men who are convalescing are apt to make love to their nurses from a combination of sentimentality and gratitude. ”

“ Unconsciously Nona sighed as one naturally would after expressing such a sentiment.
But she was stirred out of her self-centered mood by Lieutenant Martin’s suddenly stopping and directly facing her.
“That is nonsense; when Thackeray expressed a sentiment like that he was simply tired and disappointed with his own work for the moment. Life isn’t all vanity and it means a great deal to do one’s task once it is started. Besides, finding love means happiness, and love and work are the fulfilment of desire. As for being satisfied, no one wishes to be satisfied who has any brains.” ”

“ This idea was in the mind of almost every American soldier in France, although perhaps not expressed in these words. Yet each man and boy understood that the United States not only expected him to do his duty in the war, but to fulfil his own and his country’s ideal.
Yet naturally the life in the American camp in France was by no means all plain sailing. Besides the obstacles one might have reasonably expected, there was one thought which haunted the men and officers alike. ”

“ Nona explained, wondering if Madame Bonnèt and Berthe were as amazed as she was by Captain Martin’s action, and also wondering how much she betrayed her own confusion.
But, fortunately, Madame Bonnèt and Berthe insisted on returning home immediately, so that Nona could go upstairs to her room alone.
If she had been surprised earlier in the evening, she was the more so now. Captain Martin had written her a letter which one might have believed a poet could have written, never a soldier. Certainly she had misunderstood his character. But then do men and women ever understand each other? ”

“ He had not forgotten Nona’s attitude toward him, nor her words, when he had once or twice ventured too far in his revelations.
“Patients who are convalescing always think they are in love with their nurses. Please spare me the illusion,” was a never-to-be-forgotten reply.
“I will try to make the men in camp like me better if it is possible, when I return,” he answered. “It is not agreeable, is it, to be unpopular? But then you have never known that misfortune,” Lieutenant Martin continued, with such humility and good humor that it was Nona who felt reproached. ”

“ And Nona was glad to see Gene’s courage fail for a little time.
Then she added: “Do you mind my talking? Somehow it is a relief to talk. You see, after three years of war nursing I have not many illusions left. And if ever this war is over, we women must not allow another war in this world. It is our responsibility, our sin, I sometimes feel. We have accepted this world as men have made it and we have not tried to mold it nearer to our ideals. But there——” and Eugenia smiled. “What a time for me to be talking suffrage and how all this modern woman attitude hurts Henri’s preconceived ideas! ”

“ However, Nona remembered that Mildred Thornton had already written and had also told them, that Eugenia never discussed Captain Castaigne’s disappearance and no one knew what her real feeling was, or even if she believed her husband dead.
Just now and then in this world of ours and but very rarely, one may be a witness to what may well be called the miracle of love. ”

“ Nona shivered a little.
“Please don’t talk of war tonight. Of course I long for our American soldiers to get into action, I mean great numbers of them, not just a comparatively few soldiers, such as are here now. Nevertheless, I think I dread the moment when that word shall come more than almost anything in life. I shall worry over you, too, Lieutenant Martin; you see, one is always especially interested in one’s patients.” ”

“ Barbara Thornton remarked, as if she had been following but one train of thought, rather than making a careful and critical study of her guests at the same time.
Sonya Valesky was sitting in a tall carved chair drinking her tea from a clear glass in Russian fashion. She was always perfectly dressed, for she had the art of making whatever costume she wore appear the ideal one. But today she seemed even more so than usual. With her partly gray hair, her deep blue eyes with their dark brows and lashes, and the foreign look she never lost, she was an oddly arresting figure. ”

“ Moreover, in the French country there is ever a curious appeal that only a few lands have. It is a sense of intimacy, a sense of nearness to nature, as if she were really the great mother, viewing birth and life and death with a wonderful patience, knowing that within her lie always the seeds and the garden for the new generations to come.
Besides, Nona had brought Duke with her. He seemed to like to walk with her more than with anyone beside his mistress. ”

“ Eugenia spoke as if she were making a perfectly ordinary statement.
“She and her husband were raising carrier pigeons more as an amusement than for any other reason when the present war broke out,” Eugenia continued. “They immediately sent all they had to the French government and the government has been using them for their messengers, when all their wonderful telephone and telegraph systems break down, as they do now and then. But I am going to ask Madame Bonnèt to talk to you. It is fascinating to learn what part carrier pigeons can play in war.” ”

“ It was an exquisite summer day and the French landscape held a peculiar softness and beauty of form and color.
Perhaps it is well for us to recall now and then that nature has gone on with her same unchanging seasons of spring, summer, fall and winter for these past three years, when human nature has suffered such strange transformation. So Nona was glad to enjoy the landscape and her new acquaintance and to forget everything else for a little while. ”

“ My own view is that Lieutenant Hugh Kelley is about as innocent of mischief as I am. He is only a kind of kid, if he is a West [213] Point graduate, and even if he has been neglecting his work a little, he is utterly incapable of treachery. He has been homesick and I suppose he is a bit in love when he knows he has no right to be, which takes the edge off of things. But as for sending news to Germany about the American camp, it is the most preposterous idea I ever heard. No West Pointer was ever a traitor. But goodness, Nona, I did not mean to frighten you ”

“ Yet, because he was older and in many ways wiser than Nona, he appreciated the little streak of coldness in her nature, which was really more shyness than coldness, and feared to awaken her too soon.
Fanciful as we may consider the idea, the old Greeks knew the eternal types of women. In many girls, and particularly in many American girls, we find a faint echo of Diana, who, although she suffered fewer fears than other women, was the more frightened before love. ”

“ I am sure Gene would never allow me to remain at the hospital afterwards. And, somehow, to have one’s right to be a Red Cross nurse taken away would make one feel as a soldier must who is stripped of his uniform and sword. Then you see Mildred might possibly tell my mother-in-law what I have done and she has never been any too enthusiastic over me as a wife for Dick.”
The faintest suggestion of a smile appearing on Barbara’s face at this moment, Nona felt the gloom of the situation a bit lightened. ”

“ But she could not make up her mind to burden her further with the information that Lieutenant Kelley might have to meet another disillusion, more serious, perhaps, than the loss of his faith in her. For there can be nothing in the life of a soldier that comes so close to him as having his loyalty doubted.
Neither did Nona mention that Barbara might also have to clear herself of an impossible suspicion. But she was not sorry that Richard Thornton was to be with his wife for the next few days. If any difficulty should arise, Dick’s reputation was a sufficient guarantee for them both. ”

“ It remains an historical fact that civilization has always moved westward to test democracy, until the United States remained the last county in which the right of human beings to govern themselves could be proved, since there were no countries farther west. Moreover, it appeared again as if in the great war that the United States had come to be the last stronghold. For Europe alone had not been equal to the fight against autocracy. Unless the United States could turn the balance in favor of the Entente Allies, the cause of democracy might be set back many hundreds of years. ”

“ In coming abroad to do war nursing she felt that only American girls who knew enough of life to take care of themselves should be trusted with the experience.
But Eugenia was afterwards to be sorry she had not been more vigilant.
Philip Dawson and Nona in the weeks of late summer and early autumn had really explored the greater part of the nearby French countryside.
The two hours of freedom which she had each day from work, unless there was some unusual pressure, Nona liked best to spend outdoors. And never before had she known so delightful a companion. ”

“ Jeanne asked with entire seriousness. In the past months she had grown accustomed to being useful to a great many people. She ran errands at a convalescent hospital, where they were keeping certain of the soldiers who had no homes and no families to whom they could be returned. These soldiers had become the permanent wards of France. It was in this hospital Jeanne had found her Captain.
In response Barbara could only shake her head helplessly. She was glad to have Nona and Mollie distracting the little girl’s attention by the gift of a box of candy, which had been a farewell present. ”

“ She thought of saying to Barbara that, perhaps, she need not make a confession to her husband. Then Nona decided that she had no right to offer any possible advice. Since she was unmarried herself, she did not understand how complete a confidence should exist between a man and wife. It might also be a safeguard to Barbara’s future if she felt impelled to confide her first breach of faith to her husband. Nona knew Dick Thornton well enough not to envy Barbara her confession. ”

“ Nona asked, wondering again at Eugenia’s strength.
“I don’t know. I am going to hope for it and fight for it with all my strength and with all the skill we can find in the world. I shall not give up my work if it is possible to keep on, but my husband must be first. He will come here to the hospital; Madame Bonnèt and I think that best just now. We can care for him here and the great thing will be first to make him physically strong. He did not seem to wish to come tonight, but tomorrow everything will be arranged.”
“And Jeanne?” Nona inquired almost involuntarily. “What is to become of her?” ”

“ As for Lieutenant Kelley, she really did not consider him, only she knew, of course, he was the type of man who always enjoyed a mild flirtation. And Mollie and Agatha made particularly agreeable friends at present, because they were comparative strangers and therefore would not criticise her, and also because they were interested in two of the American soldiers.
Mollie and Guy Ellis who had met in such an absurd fashion, had developed a surprising interest in each other for so short an acquaintance. But then these were war times and they were both in a foreign land. ”

“ When democracy comes, when it is real democracy, and women have their share in it as well as men, I expect it will mean even more to women. You know when things are hard and unfair and there is much poverty and oppression women have always suffered more. You believe that, don’t you, Dick? I have heard you say so,” Barbara added, with an appealing note, as if she wished to find her husband in sympathy with her on this general subject, if not on the personal one. ”

“ I have been to the hospital to find you several times since my first walk with you, but always before you and Madame Castaigne have been too busy to see me.”
“Then you have heard about Lieutenant Martin?” Nona answered. “I thought the matter had been hushed up. But he should hear you say you were envious of him. Of all the impatient, bored invalids I have ever nursed, he is almost the worst. But I am sorry for him. He is not interested in anything apparently except his soldiering, and is so afraid the men in his unit will be ordered into the trenches before he is able to join them.” ”

“ Sonya now seemed to love the United States and, in spite of the turmoil in [111] Russia in her effort for freedom, to be content to remain away from her own country.
But while she was thinking, Nona had turned from the road into a side path which skirted the edge of the village. She was not afraid at being alone. For one thing, Duke was with her; for another, the soldiers had so far been universally courteous. One of General Pershing’s first requests to the American soldiers arriving in France was that they show entire respect to French women. They would surely not show less to American girls. ”

“ Nona interrupted. “Of course Lieutenant Kelley is innocent; no one could look at him or talk to him five minutes and have any other conviction. The men in camp who are saying things against him are merely trying to shield themselves.”
Nona was unashamedly crying.
“But the dreadful thing to me is that you, or that anyone has dared to talk in an unkind way about Barbara Thornton, to feel that her name has even been discussed. Why she is younger than any one of us and Eugenia and Mildred and I should have taken better care of her. ”