“Steady,” a voice said in Barbara Meade’s ear, as a strong arm slipped
across her shoulders, bracing her upright.
And so surprised was she by the voice and its intonation that she felt
herself brought back to consciousness.
“Dick Thornton,” she began weakly, and then decided that in truth she
must be taking leave of her senses, to have an image of Dick obtrude
upon her at such a moment and in such a place.
Naturally curiosity forced her to turn around and so for the instant
she forgot herself and her surroundings.
She saw a young man in a khaki uniform of a kind of olive green with
a close-fitting cap and visor. But beneath the cap was a face which
was like and yet unlike the face of the friend she remembered. This
fellow’s expression was grave, almost sad, the dark-brown eyes were no
longer indifferent and mocking, the upright figure no longer inactive.
Indeed, there was action and courage and vigor in every line of the
figure and face.
Barbara stepped back a few paces.
“Dick Thornton,” she demanded, “have I lost my mind or what has
happened? Aren’t you several thousand miles away in New York City, or
Newport, where ever the place was you intended spending the summer? I
simply can’t believe my own eyes.”
Dick slipped his arm inside Barbara Meade’s. For the time no one was
noticing them; the scene about them was absorbing every attention.
“Just a moment, please, Barbara, I want to explain the situation to
you,” Dick asked, and drew the girl away behind the shelter of one of
the hospital wagons.
“Sit down for a moment,” he urged. “Dear me, Barbara, what have they
been doing to you in the few weeks since we said good-by in good old
New York? You are as white and tiny as a little tired ghost.”
But Barbara shook her head persuasively. “Please don’t talk about me,”
she pleaded. “I must know what has occurred. What could have induced
you to come over here where this terrible war is taking place, and what
are you doing now you are here? You aren’t a soldier, are you?” And
there was little in Barbara’s expression to suggest that she wished her
friend to answer “Yes.”
Dick had also taken a seat on the ground alongside Barbara and now
quite simply he reached over and took her hand inside his in a friendly
strong grasp.
“I don’t know which question to answer first, but I’ll try and not make
a long story. I want you to know and then I want you to tell Mill.
I came over to this part of the country so as to be near you. But I
haven’t wanted to see either of you until I found out whether I was
going to amount to anything. If I wasn’t of use I was going on back
home without making a fuss. You see, Barbara, I suppose your visit to
us set me thinking. You had a kind way of suggesting, perhaps without
meaning it, that I was a pretty idle, good-for-nothing fellow, not
worth my salt, let alone the amount of sugar my father was bestowing
on me. Well, I pretended not to mind. Certainly I didn’t want a little
thing like you to find out you had made an impression on me. Still,
things you said rankled. Then you and old Mill went away. I couldn’t
get either of you out of my mind. It seemed pretty rotten, me staying
at home dancing the fox trot and you and Mill over here up against
the Lord knows what. So I--I just cleared out and came along too. But
there, I didn’t mean to talk so much. Whatever is the matter with you,
Barbara? You look like you were going to keel over again, just as you
did when you tumbled out of that car.”
The girl shook her head. “You can’t mean, Dick, that you have come over
to enlist in this war because of what I said in New York? Oh, dear me,
I thought I was unhappy enough. Now if anything happens to you your
mother will have every right not to forgive me; besides, I shall never
forgive myself.”
Barbara said the last few words under her breath. Although hearing them
perfectly, Dick Thornton only smiled.
“Oh, I wouldn’t take matters as seriously as that,” he returned. “I
didn’t mean to make you responsible for my proceedings. I only meant
you waked me up and then, please heaven, I did the rest myself. See
here, Barbara, after all I am a man, or at least made in the image of
one. And I want to tell you frankly that I’ve gone into this terrible
war game for two reasons. I don’t suppose many people do things in this
world from unmixed motives. I want to help the Allies; I think they are
right and so they have got to win. Then I thought I’d like to prove
that I had some of the real stuff in me and wasn’t just the little son
of a big man. Then, well, here are you and Mill. I’m not a whole lot
of use, but I like being around if anything should go wrong. We didn’t
know each other very long, Barbara, but I’m frank to confess I like
you. You seem to me the bravest, most go-ahead girl I ever met, and I
am proud to know you. I believe we were meant to be friends. Just see
how we have been calling each other by our first names as if we had
been doing it always. Funny how we left our titles behind us in New
York.”
Dick was talking on at random, trying to persuade his companion to a
little more cheerfulness. Surely they were meeting again in gruesome
surroundings. Yet one must not meet even life’s worst tragedies without
the courage of occasional laughter.
“But I’m not brave, or any of the things you are kind enough to think
me; I’m not even deserving of your friendship, let alone your praise,”
the girl answered meekly. Her old sparkle and fire appeared gone. Dick
Thornton was first amazed and then angry. What had they been doing
to his little friend to make her so changed in a few weeks? He said
nothing, however, only waited for her to go on.
But Barbara did not continue at once. For of a sudden there was an
unexpected noise, a savage roaring and bellowing and then a muffled
explosion.
The hand inside the American boy’s turned suddenly cold.
“What was that?” she whispered.
But Dick shook his head indifferently. “Oh, just a few big guns letting
themselves go. They do that now and then unexpectedly. There is no real
fighting. I have been here a week. Sometimes at night there is a steady
crack, crack of rifles down miles and miles of the trenches from both
sides and as far off as you can hear. Then every once in a while like
thunder of angry heathen gods the cannons roar. It’s a pretty mad, bad
world, Barbara.”
By this time the noise had died away and Barbara took her hand from
Dick’s.
“We must not stay here much longer,” she suggested, “yet I must tell
you something. You remember all the things I said to you in New York
about being useful and a girl having as much courage as a boy and the
right to live her own life and all that?”
Dick nodded encouragingly. Nevertheless and in spite of their
surroundings he had to pretend to a gravity he did not actually feel.
For to him at least Barbara appeared at this moment enchantingly pretty
and absurd.
If only she had not been so tiny and her eyes so big and softly blue!
Of course, the short brown curls were now hidden under her nurse’s
cap. But her lips were quivering and the color coming and going in
her cheeks, which now held little hollows where the roundness had
previously been.
She held her hands tight together across her knees.
“I have turned out a hopeless failure with my nursing, Dick. All
the silly things I told you about myself were just vanity. Eugenia
and Mildred and even Nona, who has had little experience, are doing
splendidly. But the Superintendent and all the people in charge of our
hospital want me to go home. You see, the trouble is I’m a coward.
Sometimes I don’t know whether I am afraid for myself or whether it is
because I am so wretched over all the pain around me. I try to believe
it is the last, but I don’t know. When that cannon was fired I was
frightened for us.”
Dick Thornton’s expression had changed. “Why, of course you were. Who
isn’t scared to death all the time in such an infernal racket? Suppose
you think I haven’t been frightened out of my senses all this week? I
just go about with my knees shaking and scarcely know what I’m doing.
The soldiers tell me they feel the same way when they first get into
the firing line; after a while one gets more used to it. But see here,
Barbara,” Dick’s brows knit and the lines about his handsome mouth
deepened. “If you feel the way you say you do, in heaven’s name tell me
what you mean by coming so near the battlefield? Whatever put it into
your head to attempt this ambulance work? Why don’t you stay at the
hospital and make yourself useful? That’s what Mildred is doing, isn’t
she?”
Barbara nodded. “Yes, but I wasn’t useful at the hospital. So I decided
to walk right up to the cannon’s mouth and see if I couldn’t conquer
myself. If my nerves don’t go to pieces here I feel I can endure most
anything afterwards.” Barbara glanced fearfully about her. Fortunately
they were hidden from any sight of suffering. Then she got quietly up
on her feet.
“I must go to my work now, I’m afraid I have already been shirking,”
she said. “But please, Dick, you have not yet answered my question.
What is it you are doing with the army? Have you enlisted as a soldier?”
Dick took off his cap. Already his skin had darkened from the week’s
hardships and exposure, for a line of white showed between his hair and
the end of his cap.
“No, I am not a soldier, Barbara. After all, you know I am an American
and I don’t quite feel like killing anybody, German or no German. So
I am trying to do the little I can to help the fellows who are hurt,
just as you are, although in a different fashion. Remember I told you
once that my real gift might be that of a chauffeur. Well, that’s what
I am these days, a glorified chauffeur. I am running one of the field
ambulances. You see, I am a pretty skilful driver. I go out over the
fields with my car whenever the Deutschers give us a chance and with
two other fellows pick up the wounded Tommies and try to rush them back
to safety. It’s a pretty exciting business. But somehow in spite of
being scared I like it.”
Barbara again held out her hand. “Will you shake hands with me before
we have to say good-by? Because I want you to know that when I thought
you were careless and good for nothing you were really brave and
splendid. While I--oh, well, it is tiresome to talk about oneself.
You’ll come to see us as soon as you can. Mildred will be so anxious.
And please, please be careful for her sake.”
For half a moment Barbara had an impulse to mention Mildred Thornton’s
intimacy with Brooks Curtis, the young newspaper correspondent, to
her brother. But then she realized that there was not time. Moreover,
Mildred would probably prefer telling him whatever there might be to
tell herself.
Besides, at this instant Nona Davis appeared, looking both worried and
annoyed. What had become of Barbara Meade that she was not attending to
her duties? Was she ill again?
Naturally on discovering Barbara talking to a stranger at such a time
Nona was puzzled and displeased. She had never seen Dick Thornton to
know him, although Mildred had of course frequently spoken of her
brother.
A few seconds later, when the necessary explanations had been made,
Nona and Barbara went together into the temporary hospital building.
Dick found his quarters and dropped asleep. He had not thought it worth
while to mention to Barbara that he had been working like a Hercules
since earliest dawn.