L’Envoi to Glorious France
A short time after, trunks were being brought down from the attic of the
house at Versailles and being gradually packed. Other arrangements were
also being made in a leisurely fashion for the closing of the house which
Miss Patricia had rented only for a season.
She had grown impatient to return to her work in the devastated districts
of France, for now that the war was over the appeal for food and other
aid was growing more insistent than ever, and idleness, such as she felt
the months at Versailles had represented, at no time really interested
Miss Patricia Lord.
Captain Richard Burton had arrived in Versailles a week before and was
compelled to leave for England within a short time on a special mission
for the Red Cross.
The Camp Fire girls were therefore separating for the first time in many
months, since Vera Lagerloff and Alice Ashton were to accompany Miss Lord
and continue the relief work in France, while the other girls were going
with Captain and Mrs. Burton to spend the summer in England.
Apparently definite arrangements of some character had been made for each
person who shared Miss Patricia’s hospitality during the memorable spring
in France, save the two members of her household, Marguerite Arnot and
Julie Dupont and the new group of French Camp Fire girls, the little
French midinettes, for whom Miss Patricia was acting as Camp Fire
guardian and whom she apparently had taken under her special protection.
On this morning Marguerite Arnot and Julie Dupont were both at work in
the big room which had been devoted to their use ever since their
installation at the house in Versailles. At the same time they had
continued their work they had received a generous recompense for their
service, so that, as the two girls had been at no expense, they both
possessed more money than at any previous time in their lives.
Julie was too young to do sewing of an important character; at present
she was engaged in pulling basting threads from an evening dress of Mrs.
Burton’s in which Marguerite Arnot had made a slight alteration.
She was frowning with her dark, heavy brows drawn close together and her
lips puckered, yet in spite of her evident bad temper, she looked
prettier and in better health than in a long time.
“I have something to tell you, Marguerite,” she began, “although you need
not offer me advice in return.
“Your friend, Miss Lord, invited me into her room last night and told me
she would pay my expenses at a boarding school for the next two years if
I chose to go. The school would not be an expensive one, as she had many
other demands upon her fortune which she plainly considered more
important. She also announced that I particularly required a discipline
which I had never received. Did you know, Marguerite, that Miss Lord has
also asked the group of girls with whom I used to live, her own French
Camp Fire group, to go with her to work among the poor children in the
devastated country? They are to sew for the poor and help in any way
possible in order that they may be trained perhaps as teachers for the
home for orphan children which Miss Lord hopes at some future time to
establish in France.”
Marguerite Arnot stopped sewing for a moment.
“I trust you accepted Miss Lord’s offer, Julie. You will probably never
have another such opportunity in your life and Miss Patricia is right
when she says you are in need of discipline. How little like a fairy
godmother Miss Patricia looks and yet what wonderful things she does for
everybody!”
“Yes, for everybody except you, Marguerite Arnot, and yet I once thought
you were her favorite. If it were not for _you_ I should accept Miss
Lord’s offer; I am not so stupid that I do not realize what even two
years of education may do toward giving me a better start in life.
Besides, I know my father would have wished me to accept; he was always
insisting that I had no proper education without making the effort to see
that I did have one. Really, Marguerite, I think you might have done
something for yourself, so that I should not have to worry over you.’
In spite of Julie’s absurdity, the older girl smiled and sighed almost in
the same instant, since even so unreasonable an affection was not to be
disregarded.
“I don’t know just what remarkable future you think I should have worked
out for myself in the past few months, Julie. Just the same I think I can
continue to make my living without your sacrificing yourself. Perhaps
with your cleverness and with Miss Patricia to help you by paying for
your schooling you may turn out to be a famous woman some day and be able
to care for me after all! I am not so clever as you are!”
Julie nodded.
“No, you are not, that is why I am so anxious for you to marry. You
really need some one to look after you. It was for that reason I arranged
for you to go to the Queen’s secret garden. I have been hoping Mr. Hale
would become more interested in you, but I’m afraid after all he prefers
Miss Graham. You would have liked him to care for you, wouldn’t you,
Marguerite?”
Julie’s state of mind, her amazing candor were the attributes of a
thoroughly untrained child, nevertheless Marguerite Arnot’s long patience
could endure no more.
“Never make a speech of that kind to me again as long as you live, Julie.
But one thing I would like to understand. What do you mean by saying you
arranged for me to go to the Queen’s secret garden? Was I invited by Mrs.
Burton, Bettina Graham, or Mr. Hale?”
Julie shrugged her little French shoulders.
“You were invited by no one of them, your invitation came from me. I
simply pretended to you that you were asked, thinking you might make the
best of the opportunity. But since you had an agreeable time and nothing
happened I don’t see the difference.”
Annoyed by her older friend’s manner Julie had begun her speech in anger,
but at its conclusion she was also a little frightened.
Without replying Marguerite Arnot arose and left the room.
In Mrs. Burton’s sitting-room, she was fortunate enough to discover both
Mrs. Burton and Bettina Graham, who had been reading a letter together
and discussing it.
“I am so glad it is you, Marguerite,” Mrs. Burton declared, as Marguerite
entered after knocking. “Bettina and I were just planning to send for you
to ask if you would have a talk with us. I suppose you know that Aunt
Patricia and I have been arguing as to whether you are to stay with her
in France for the relief work or to come to England for the summer with
me. But as a matter of fact Aunt Patricia really agrees with me and we
both feel you have worked long enough for the time being and are in need
of a real holiday. So first of all, will you come with us to England,
Marguerite, as one of my Camp Fire girls? Afterwards, Bettina’s mother,
who is my dearest friend and the most charming woman in the world
besides, wishes you to come to the United States if you like and first of
all to her home in Washington. The opportunities for your work ought to
be better in the United States in the next few years than in France, and
Mrs. Graham will be able to give you a start in Washington and take care
of you and be very grateful to you in the bargain.”
“But Mrs Burton,” Marguerite protested, a little overcome by so much
generosity and such a bewildering number of opportunities, “you will be
good enough to give me time to think over what you have proposed. Of
course I know I shall love to go to England for the summer, but the
United States seems so far away. What I really came down to see you for
was to apologize; I did not know until a moment ago that no one of you
invited me on your excursion to the Queen’s garden the other afternoon.
It was a wretched mistake and I’m sorry, I can’t explain exactly what
happened or why I thought I was asked without involving some one else.”
“Then don’t attempt it for goodness sake, Marguerite, because it was
delightful to have you!” Bettina answered quickly, sympathizing with the
other girl’s embarrassment, although not understanding the situation.
“It was really a piece of good fortune, wasn’t it after all, Marguerite,
a piece of good fortune for me, since it afforded me my only chance for a
talk with you alone since our acquaintance?” Mrs. Burton added. “Now you
two girls please go away and leave me, because I have some most important
work to do. I must write Madame Clermont instructions and suggestions
regarding the future of the Camp Fire organization in France.”
Ten days later, accompanied by Marguerite Arnot and five of the American
Camp Fire girls, Captain and Mrs. Burton sailed for England.
They were crossing from Boulogne to Folkestone on a late spring
afternoon; it was toward the close of a warm and quiet day so that the
water was still and blue.
On this passage the little channel steamer was largely filled by British
officers and soldiers returning home after service in France.
As the boat pushed off from the French shore a farewell shout rang out
from the people crowding the dock; from somewhere back in the old French
town a Cathedral bell began chiming an evening hymn.
A British officer chanced to be standing beside Mrs. Burton, both of them
leaning over the railing watching the receding line of shore.
“It has been a great adventure, Madame, a world adventure, this fighting
for brotherhood in France. I see you are an American woman, yet whether
or not one ever returns to these shores, the old axiom is now forever
true, every one of us who has lived in France during the war will
henceforward have two countries—his own and Glorious France!”
The officer, lifting his hand, saluted the French shore.
Footnotes
[1]See “The Camp Fire Girls on the Field of Honor.”
[2]See “The Camp Fire Girls on the Field of Honor.”
[3]See “The Camp Fire Girls on the Field of Honor.”
STORIES ABOUT CAMP FIRE GIRLS
List of Titles in the Order of their Publication
The Camp Fire Girls at Sunrise Hill—1913
The Camp Fire Girls Amid the Snows—1913
The Camp Fire Girls in the Outside World—1914
The Camp Fire Girls Across the Sea—1914
The Camp Fire Girls’ Careers—1915
The Camp Fire Girls in After Years—1915
The Camp Fire Girls on the Edge of the Desert—1917
The Camp Fire Girls at the End of the Trail—1917
The Camp Fire Girls Behind the Lines—1918
The Camp Fire Girls on the Field of Honor—1918
The Camp Fire Girls in Glorious France—1919
Transcriber’s Notes
--Copyright notice provided as in the original printed text—this e-text
is public domain in the country of publication.
--Silently corrected palpable typos.
--Moved promotional material to the end of the text.
--Corrected inconsistently-cited book titles to match the actual book.