A TOUGH JOB
It was the first week in November, and a chilly wind was blowing across
Governor's Island, shaking down the last leaves from the bare branches
of the trees and tossing those on the ground into swirling heaps.
The sentry walking past the Gordons' house wore an overcoat now, and
Quartermaster's men were putting up storm doors and windows all along
General's Row.
Lucy and Marian were hurrying home from the Matthews', for it was
almost lunch time. For a month and a half Anne Matthews' governess had
been giving lessons every morning to Anne, Julia, Lucy and Marian, and
she made them work hard enough to be hungry by twelve o'clock. Mrs.
Gordon had half intended sending Lucy to boarding-school this year,
but just now she did not feel like losing her from home, and Lucy's
interest in the plan had also faded. She might have gone over to the
city to school, but her mother would not consent to this for Marian,
and had been very glad on the whole to accept Mrs. Matthews' proposal.
The four girls got along companionably together under Miss Ellis, and
Marian had surprised them all by her quickness in catching up in spite
of her handicap of lost schooling.
"It's really cold, but it can't be winter yet," said Lucy, thrusting
her bare hands into her sweater pocket and looking reproachfully at the
sun, which did not feel so warm as it used to.
"There's only a month and a half till Christmas, though," Marian
reminded her. "When we began tying up the soldiers' Christmas packages
last week it seemed awfully like winter, but Julia says maybe we'll
have Indian summer yet."
"I never could make out when Indian summer comes. It's always coming
soon and then the first thing you know there's a snow-storm," remarked
Lucy, running up the piazza steps as she caught sight of her mother
sitting inside the window.
Mrs. Gordon was reading a letter in the sitting-room, still wearing
the hat and coat in which she had come from the Red Cross, and Lucy
exclaimed as she entered the room:
"Oh, Mother, did you--is it from Bob?"
"Yes, sit down and we'll read it together," said Mrs. Gordon, looking
up for a second from the closely-written sheets.
Bob's letters, arriving very erratically from France, sometimes two
and three at a time and often weeks apart, were precious things these
days, and Lucy needed no second bidding. Marian, too, pulled off her
blue velvet tam and sank down on the floor by Lucy's side while Mrs.
Gordon recommenced the letter aloud.
"DEAR MOTHER AND ALL OF YOU:
"No news from home for a week, because I haven't been where I could
get any, but hope to by to-morrow, when I shall have a chance to stop
at my headquarters. I'll mail this then, too, if somebody doesn't turn
up to take it in the meantime.
"It's three weeks to-day since I was transferred to the Aviation
Section of the Signal Corps, and I am just about beginning to realize
how little I know, though it seems as if I had never worked so
hard in my life. Behind the lines here--there's no use in my being
more definite, for they wouldn't pass my letter--we beginners are
kept at it, as long as there is daylight to work by, overhauling
the airplanes after every flight, and learning their construction
from end to end. I have been up twice as observer, both times with
Benton--he's a wonder in the air. They are awfully short of observers
here, and I draw pretty well, and know how to take pictures. But that
is as far as I have got yet, and it seems very little when there is
such a monstrous lot of work waiting to be done.
"We get plenty to eat, Mother, and if we didn't there's a little
village right behind us where they sell you food for almost
nothing,--they'd give it to us if we hadn't the money to pay. I
think these are the kindest, friendliest people in the world.
They can't do enough to welcome us here, and it's funny how much
friendship can be expressed without knowing each other's language. My
French, as you know, is rather weak, but it's better than the enlisted
men's,--still they seem to get what they want.
"Well, I must tell you the best piece of news I have. I met Dick
Harding on the road day before yesterday, while I was marching a
detachment from our squadron back to camp after an exercising hike.
He was riding on reconnoitering duty with some other officers, so of
course there wasn't much time. But when he saw me he pulled up and
jumped off his horse, and I halted my men while we shook hands and
grinned at each other and tried to get everything we wanted to say
into about three minutes. I sure was glad to see him. He asked about
you all and what I was doing and tried to arrange a meeting when we
should be off duty, though that's always too uncertain to count on.
"He looks well, though a little thin. Of course I hadn't seen him
since my furlough. He says his regiment--you know which it is--will
go into the first line trenches this week. It has been declared in
first-class condition and training, and mentioned already in home
despatches. He is awfully proud about it, of course, and wants to show
what they can do. It made me more than ever anxious to get somewhere
in aviation. They need every one of us right now. He had to mount
again almost at once to overtake the others, and I don't know when we
can find each other, for we are ten miles apart even while he's behind
the firing line.
"Father's regiment is somewhere in this sector, he told me."
"Oh, Lucy, wasn't it fine for Bob to see him!" Mrs. Gordon stopped
reading to exclaim.
"Wasn't it?" said Lucy with shining eyes. "I've been hoping so they
would meet. But go on, Mother, won't you?"
"There isn't much more," said Mrs. Gordon, turning to the last page.
"Don't worry about whether you are sending me the right things for
Christmas. If I get some of Lucy's fudge I shall be thankful. We
appreciate things so much more over here that it ought to be easier
to choose them than when we were at home. Compared with the French we
have so much just now. I hope the people back home won't forget that
there are few families in this part of France who have any money left
to buy presents for their own soldiers. But anyway, we'll share what
we have with them. Nobody could help doing that.
"I have to get into my oiling togs now and go over a machine that has
just come in. It's Benton's, and he has been flying over the German
trenches. He came to the door of my place just then to say he was
nearly frozen and was going to take a run to warm up. Our shacks are
getting cold at night, too, but some of the men are out to-day cutting
fire-wood.
"Good-bye, if I don't find time to write any more to-day. I'm almost
too sleepy at night to put anything like a sentence together. But I
always think of you a lot.
"With much love,
"BOB."
"He never said whether our fruit cake came or not, Lucy," cried Marian,
disappointed. "But perhaps it's waiting where the rest of his mail is,"
she reflected, tossing back her bright hair to look up inquiringly into
Mrs. Gordon's face.
"Yes, probably it is, dear," Mrs. Gordon agreed, putting Bob's letter
carefully back into its envelope. "I'm glad they have plenty to eat,"
she added with a smothered little sigh. "Lucy, call in William and
we'll have lunch. Here comes Father now. He has to hurry off to-day to
inspect supplies for these new recruits."
The post had seen a good many changes in the two months since Bob's
regiment sailed. Many women of the Twenty-Eighth had packed up and gone
away to their old homes or elsewhere. The new Infantry battalion had
already been succeeded by another, and of the recruits of the early
summer many were already overseas and all were trained men scattered to
various regiments. Those drilling on the post now were not so numerous
since the National Army camps had opened, though several hundred still
remained in training, destined to fill vacancies among the regulars.
In October another regiment had camped overnight on Governor's Island
to slip away to their transports at dawn. But this one had not been so
fortunate as the Twenty-Eighth, and had sent back word of an uneasy
passage made among attacking submarines in the midst of a heavy storm
which almost drove the transports from their convoy.
Mr. Leslie was straining every nerve to supply his lumber for
ship-building as fast as the government asked for it, and he wrote
feelingly of the great difficulties in the way of transportation, but
also of brave and patriotic efforts in the West to get the utmost
accomplished. He wrote much, too, rather anxiously, about his prolonged
absence, though he had been a good deal cheered by Marian's letters,
which showed an increasing interest in her cousins and in the life of
the post.
Marion had taken it on herself to help Lucy a little in the tasks that
fell to her share while Margaret was their only servant, and after
luncheon they went out together on the piazza to put it in order after
William's playing circus there with the puppy most of the morning.
William tried to help by picking up his blocks, but did not make much
of a success of it and ended by sitting on the steps and holding Happy
in his arms, while the puppy wriggled with wild curiosity to get down
and find out what a squirrel on the grass was burying with its quick
little paws at the foot of a tree.
"No, you can't bother him. He has to get his meals buried for the
winter," William scolded, struggling with the fat little beast, which
was almost as strong as he was.
"Oh, let him go, William," said Lucy. "You know he's afraid of the
squirrels when he gets near them. He just wants to prance around and
bark at them."
"All right, then," said William, opening his arms and letting Happy go
with a wild rush and scamper down the steps, which finished as usual
in his backing hastily away from the angry, chattering squirrel before
him, to stand furiously barking for a minute, then stopping short to
wag his tail in the most friendly way as though peace had been declared.
"He's a fake," said Lucy laughing. "He can't expect to scare them after
that."
Marian went indoors, when they had cleared things up, to take her daily
nap, and Lucy followed her mother up-stairs and into her room.
"What are you going to do, Mother?" she asked uncertainly.
"Well, I think I'll mend some of William's clothes first," said Mrs.
Gordon, sitting down beside her work-table. "Why, Lucy?"
"I just wanted to talk to you a few minutes," Lucy began, her face
grown serious as she sat down and clasped her hands about one knee.
"Mother, I feel like an awful good-for-nothing saying this, but I can't
help it. I just have the blues terribly, and somehow it seems as though
we were all waiting for dreadful things to happen, and nothing seems
worth doing--at least nothing that I can do."
Lucy's burst of unhappiness did not seem to surprise her mother
very much, though she laid down her work a moment and looked rather
anxiously at her daughter as she answered.
"I know, Lucy. I'm afraid we all feel a little bit that way just now.
It's a serious, worrying time for almost everybody, and the uncertainty
of what lies before us is the hardest of all to bear. But you know,
dear, if we give up being cheerful and brave we shan't get any work
done and we'll feel worse than ever. Besides that, our letters to Bob
will be anything but a comfort to him. We have got to find courage
just as the women and girls of France and England did. And if you want
useful work to do this winter besides our Red Cross, I will tell you of
some right now."
"Oh, what, Mother? I'd like to pitch right in and do something with all
my might!" cried Lucy from the depths of her eager, restless soul.
"You won't think much of it when you hear what it is," said Mrs. Gordon
smiling. "There isn't any glory in it, but I mean it when I say that
it is something worth while. I want you to give up your time and
thoughts to making Marian a healthy, happy girl before her father comes
home."
"Oh, Mother," said Lucy, disappointed.
"I know it doesn't sound very inspiring, but take my word for it your
reward will come if you do what lies in your way, and, Lucy, you never
had a better chance to do something worth doing."
Lucy sat motionless, staring at the floor, like a statue in a blue
serge sailor-suit. Her mother picked up her work again and began sewing
a rip in William's rompers, while Lucy moved a little, unclasped her
hands about her knee and took a turn in staring at the ceiling. Her
face was not exactly gay, though no one could accuse her of sulkiness.
She looked like a person thinking out a sum in arithmetic. At last she
spoke.
"Well, Mother, I'll try. Are you quite sure about that reward?" she
asked, smiling now as she turned to her mother with a rather mocking
twinkle in her hazel eyes.
"Quite sure," said Mrs. Gordon, undismayed. "One way or another
it will come." She smiled back at her daughter, well pleased with
Lucy's answer, for she knew it to be as good as a promise, and its
accomplishment would mean something gained not only for Marian but for
Lucy as well.
"I'm not surprised that you took a minute to think it over," she
continued seriously. "I know it won't be easy."
"Well, I said I wanted a tough job to tackle," said Lucy, rising from
her chair with a faint sigh. "Don't expect any startling results," she
warned her mother, breaking into another smile as she looked back at
her. "I'll get Marian now and go over to the Red Cross for a while. I
promised Julia."
Half an hour later, when the three girls were at work over a table of
gauze in the Red Cross rooms, Lucy began wondering to herself, even
while she talked of other things, how she was going to accomplish
what she had undertaken. She glanced at Marian, whose golden head was
industriously bent over her work, wishing rather helplessly for a wand
which, with one quick wave, would transform Marian into a strong,
active girl, with no nerves to bother about.
Any one spending the day at the Gordon house now would probably have
seen little to find fault with in Marian and much that was attractive.
Nobody gave her more credit than Lucy for the change in her during
the past few months, which had turned Lucy's feeling for her cousin
from pity to warm liking and even admiration. But the improvement had
only begun, and it only persisted as long as Marian was amused or
interested or her sympathy aroused. There were still times of sulky
indifference, of listless weariness, and most of all of obstinate
refusal to help herself or exert her will to exercise or to eat her
meals when she did not happen to feel like it. These were the hurdles
in Lucy's way if she was to make Marian well and happy as every
fourteen-year-old girl ought to be, and the obstacles loomed rather
large just now, even with Marian before her in her brightest mood, and
looking so pretty as she laughed and talked while her fingers worked
that no one would have credited her with a single pout.
Unconsciously Lucy commenced the best way, for as she listened to
Marian telling Julia the story of Happy's complete destruction of her
best hat, Lucy summed up two great qualities in Marian's favor, and
began to feel a wider understanding and sympathy with her cousin for
thinking of them. Marian was extremely generous. She loved to give
things away, and the loss of any of her own possessions worried her
very little, or if as in this case it was a disappointment, she bore
it good-humoredly. She even gave the puppy a forgiving pat with the
poppies torn from her hat still clenched in his wicked jaws. Here Lucy
skipped to the second point in her catalogue of virtues. Marian was
certainly not vain or even conscious of her beauty. Beyond a careful
regard for her appearance which had been taught her since babyhood,
she gave little thought to herself and laughed in honest amusement if
Lucy grew enthusiastic sometimes when her pretty little cousin put on
something especially becoming.
Occupied with these thoughts, Lucy did not get so much work done as the
others, besides being rather silent, and provokingly failing to answer
several times when she was spoken to.
"Lucy Gordon, you've only made fifteen compresses, and you have been
quiet enough to work, goodness knows," said Julia at last, looking at
her friend with accusing eyes. "Of course if you're thinking out how
to end the war or something really important to the country we won't
disturb you, but you might think aloud. I'd like to hear it."
Lucy laughed. "My ideas would be almost as valuable as our parole
man's. He is always telling Margaret what he thinks of the war. The
other day I was out in the kitchen making fudge for Bob----Oh, dear,"
she interrupted herself, "it will be so stale when he gets it if he
only goes for his mail every week or two!"
"But what were you going to say?" insisted Julia, as Lucy seemed to
have subsided.
"Oh, only that I listened to Mat talking to Margaret in the pantry. He
said, 'You see, it's this way. Either the Eye-talians will be able to
stay where they are, or they will have to retreat.' I felt like telling
him that maybe Margaret could have thought that out for herself, but
she seemed quite impressed by it."
"Is she nice? Do you like her?" asked Julia. "I don't see her often the
way I used to Elizabeth."
"Oh, she's nice," said Lucy. "She's kind of poky, and of course Father
thinks Karl is the only person in the world who makes good coffee,
but Margaret almost suits him. We do miss Elizabeth awfully, though.
William simply can't get used to having her gone. He asked me yesterday
if I thought Elizabeth would like Happy when she came back. He doesn't
seem to get it through his head that she isn't coming back."
"She might, though, Lucy, when the war is over," suggested Marian.
"Yes--when," said Lucy without much enthusiasm, thinking of Bob.
"Have you any idea where they are now?" asked Julia, beginning to pile
up her finished work.
"No, not a bit. Elizabeth said something to me the day she left about
going to Sweden, but I don't really think she knew. Karl told Father
they might go to Mexico. She sent William a post-card from Boston a few
days after they left here."
"Let's stop now and go outdoors," proposed Julia, pushing back her
chair. "I'm so tired of sitting still I'm getting fidgety."
"Let's go out and teach Marian to play golf," said Lucy, taking her
bull by the horns.
"Yes! Will you come, Marian?" urged Julia. "We'll only play a little
while until it gets dark. I know you'll like it."
"I'll come along and watch you, anyway," hedged Marian, reaching for
her hat and not looking especially eager for a new effort.
"But it's no fun watching, and you'd love it so if you only once got
interested," insisted Lucy, as the three got up and found their hats
and sweaters. "I wish Bob had stayed long enough to teach you! He said
he would and maybe you'd have let him. Come on, so we can write and
tell him how much you've done--won't you?"
They had reached the foot of the stairs to the first floor by the time
Lucy finished her appeal, and as they stepped outdoors Marian demanded
with a sudden, fleeting smile:
"If I play this once, Lucy, will you let me alone afterward?"
"I promise," said Lucy promptly, with unshaken confidence in her
favorite game. "It's you who won't let me alone then."