"Yes, I like the kit," she said, "and I'm glad you came to show
yourself, because I've got a little present for you." He winced.
"I ought to say," he remarked, "that I have already received five
barbed-wire-cutters, three vacuum flasks, eleven comforters, six writing
blocks----"
"Oh, but _this_ won't take up any room," and she held out a woollen
helmet of the popular colour.
"Thanks awfully," he replied, drawing back, "but I never wear them."
"Of course you don't," she said; "they're not meant for tennis
tournaments or the opera, but for the campaigner whose lodging is on the
cold bare ground. In fact when once he gets it on he never wants to take
it off again."
"From the look of it," he remarked, "it will be a case of Hobson's
choice. You've underrated the size."
"I took your measurements last week," she said coldly.
"But that was before I joined the colours. You forgot to allow for
subsequent developments."
"In any case the wool stretches," she observed. "Are you going to try it
on?"
"It will play the very deuce with my hair," he objected.
"Very well," she said. "Dick shall have it."
"Never," he exclaimed, and snatching up the woollen object, began to ram
his sleek head into the small aperture at the bottom.
Halfway through, apparently yielding to panic, he sought to return to
fresh air and the light of day, but her hands ruthlessly seized the
elaborate crochet edging, and pulled and tugged it down mercilessly
towards his shoulders until his distorted features appeared at the hole
in front with a pop, and she clapped her hands in delight.
"It fits you like a glove," she cried, "and though your nose is a bit
red you look quite handsome."
"I'm being strangled," he gasped, clutching at his throat; "take it
off!"
"In time of war," she observed, "we all have to put up with a little
inconvenience. I shall soon be living on turnips, for instance, and you
know how I hate them."
With a strange gurgling in his throat, he collapsed on the Chesterfield.
His face grew purple, his eyes bulged and rolled, his veins swelled, his
head dropped forward. She grew alarmed.
"Are you really choking?" she exclaimed. "Here, take your hands away.
Let me help! Good gracious! _Darling!_ Oh! Whatever shall I do?" She
sprang for her scissors, and in a moment the helmet lay on the carpet
hopelessly mutilated.
"Thanks," he replied, smoothing his ruffled hair. "In another minute the
Germans would have missed their billet."
"Neither you nor Dick will be able to wear it now," she said, and her
lip trembled.
"Dick won't," he said, "and as a matter of fact I'm going to."
"How _can_ you?" And there was a catch in her voice.
"Not on my head perhaps, but on my heart--or rather," he added, slipping
a khaki arm round her, "on the place where my heart used to be."
Next morning, on parade, his chest measurement was the object of
universal envy.
* * * * *