"We are making some rather interesting experiments—psycho-analysis—things like that—"

He stood up. He was big and breezy. "What's the matter with you this morning? You ought to be up and out."

Derry flushed. "Nothing—much."

The Doctor sat down again. "I'd tell most men to take a cold shower and a two hours' tramp, but it's more than that with you—."

"It's a ease of suspended activity. I want to get into the war—"

"Why don't you?"

"I can't leave Dad. Surely you can see that."

"I don't see it. He must reap, every man must."

"But there's more than that. My mother tied me by a promise. And people are calling me a coward—even Dad thinks I am a slacker, and I can't say to him, 'If you were more than the half of a man I might be a whole one.'"

"Your mother couldn't have foreseen this war."

"It would have made no difference. Her world was centered in him. You know, of course, Doctor, that I wouldn't have spoken of this to anyone else—"

"My dear fellow, I am father confessor to half of my patients." The Doctor's eyes were kind. "My lips will be sealed. But if you want my advice I should throw the old man overboard. Let him sink or swim. Your life is your own."

"It has never been my own." He went to a desk and took out an envelope. "It's a rather sacred letter, but I want you to read it—I read it for the first time last night."

When at last the Doctor laid the letter down, Derry said very low, "Do you blame me?"

"My dear fellow; she had no right to ask it."

"But having asked—?"

"It is a moving letter, and you loved her—but I still contend she had no right to ask."

"I gave my sacred word."

"I question whether any promise should stand between a man and his country's need of him."

They faced each other. "I wonder—" Derry said, "I—I must think it over, Doctor."

"Give yourself a chance if you do. We can go too far in our sacrifice for others—." He resumed his brisk professional manner. "In the meantime you've a rather sick old gentleman on your hands. You'd better get a nurse."



CHAPTER VII

HILDA

The argument came up at breakfast two days before Thanksgiving. It was a hot argument. Jean beat her little hands upon the table. Hilda's hands were still, but it was an irritating stillness.

"What do you think, Daddy?"

"Hilda is right. There is no reason why we should go to extremes."

"But a turkey—."

"Nobody has said that we shouldn't have a turkey on Thanksgiving—not even Hoover." Hilda's voice was as irritating as her hands.

"Well, we have consciences, Hilda. And a turkey would choke me."

"You make so much of little things."

"Is it a little thing to sacrifice our appetites?"

"I don't think it is a very big thing." The office bell rang, and Hilda rose. "If I felt as you do I should sacrifice something more than things to eat. I'd go over there and nurse the wounded. I could be of real service. But you couldn't. With all your big ideas of patriotism you couldn't do one single practical thing."

It was true, and Jean knew that it was true, but she fired one more shot. "Then why don't you go?" she demanded fiercely.

"I may," Hilda said slowly. "I have been thinking about it. I haven't made up my mind."

Dr. McKenzie glanced at her in surprise. "I didn't dream you felt that way."

"I don't think I do mean it in the way you mean. I should go because there was something worth doing—not as a grandstand play."

She went out of the room. Jean stared after her.

The Doctor laughed. "She got you there, girlie."

"Yes, she did. Do you really think she intends to go, Daddy?"

"It is news to me."

"Good news?"

He shook his head. "She is a very valuable nurse. I should hate to lose her." He sat for a moment in silence, then stood up. "I shouldn't hold out for a turkeyless Thanksgiving if I were you. It isn't necessary."

"Are you taking Hilda's part, Daddy?"

"No, my dear, of course not." He came over and kissed her. "Will you ride with me this morning?"

"Oh, yes—how soon?"

"In ten minutes. After I see this patient."

In less time than that she was ready and waiting for him in her squirrel coat and hat and her little muff.

Her father surveyed her. "Such a lovely lady."

"Do you like me, Daddy?"

"What a question—I love you."

Safe in the car, with the glass screen shutting away the chauffeur, Jean returned to the point of attack.

"Hilda makes me furious, Daddy. I came to talk about her."

"I thought you came because you wanted to ride with me."

"Well, I did. But for this, too."

Over her muff, her stormy eyes surveyed him. "You think I am unreasonable about meatless and wheatless days. But you don't know. Hilda ignores them, Daddy—you should see the breadbox. And the other day she ordered a steak for dinner, one of those big thick ones—and it was Tuesday, and I happened to go down to the kitchen and saw it—and I told the cook that we wouldn't have it, and when I came up I told Hilda, and she laughed and said that I was silly.

"And I said that if she had that steak cooked I would not eat it, and I should ask you not to eat it, and she just stood with her hands flat on your desk, you know the way she does—I hate her hands—and she said that of course if I was going to make a fuss about it she wouldn't have the steak, but that it was simply a thing she couldn't understand. The steak was there, why not eat it? And I said it was because of the psychological effect on other people. And she said we were having too much psychology and not enough common sense in this war!

"Well, after that, I went to my Red Cross meeting at the church. I expected to have lunch there, but I changed my mind and came home. Hilda was at the table alone, and, Daddy, she was eating the steak, the whole of it—." She paused to note the effect of her revelation.

"Well?"

"She was eating it when all the world needs food! She made me think of those dreadful creatures in the fairy books. She's—she's a ghoul—"

"My dear."

"A ghoul. You should have seen her, with great chunks of bread and butter."

"Hilda has a healthy appetite."

"Of course you defend her."

"My dear child—"

"Oh you do, Daddy, always, against me—and I'm your daughter—"

She wept a tear or two into her muff, then raised her eyes to find him regarding her quizzically. "Are you going to spoil my ride?"

"You are spoiling mine."

"We won't quarrel about it. And we'll stop at Small's. Shall it be roses or violets, to-day, my dear?"

She chose violets, as more in accord with her pensive mood, lighting the bunch, however, with one red rose. The question of Hilda was not settled, but she yielded as many an older woman has yielded—to the sweetness of tribute—to man's impulse to make things right not by justice but by the bestowal of his bounty.

From the florist's, they went to Huyler's old shop on F Street, where the same girl had served Jean with ice-cream sodas and hot chocolate for fifteen years. Administrations might come and administrations go, but these pleasant clerks had been cup-bearers to them all—Presidents' daughters and diplomats' sons—the sturdy children of plain Congressmen, the scions of noble families across the seas.

It was while Jean sat on a high stool beside her father, the sunshine shining on her through the wide window, that Derry Drake, coming down Twelfth, saw her!

Well, he wanted a lemonade. And the fact that she was there in a gray squirrel coat and bunch of violets with her copper-colored hair shining over her ears wasn't going to leave him thirsty!

He went in. He bowed to the Doctor and received a smile in return. Jean's eyes were cold above her chocolate. Derry bought his check, went to a little table on the raised platform at the back of the room, drank his lemonade and hurried out.

"A nice fellow," said the Doctor, watching him through the window. "I wonder why he didn't stop and speak to us?"

"I'm glad he didn't."

"My dear, why?"

"I've found out things—"

"What things?"

"That he's a—coward," with tense earnestness. "He won't fight."

"Who told you that?"

"Everybody's saying it."

"Everybody is dead wrong."

"What do you mean, Daddy?"

"What I have just said. Everybody is dead wrong."

"How do you know?"

"A doctor knows a great many things which he is not permitted to tell. I am rather bound not to tell in this case."

"Oh, but you could tell me."

"Hardly—it was given in confidence."

"Did he? Oh, Daddy, did he tell you?"

"Yes."

"And he isn't a slacker?"

"No."

"I knew it—."

"You didn't. You thought he was a coward."

"Well, I ought to have known better. He looks brave, doesn't he?"

"I shouldn't call him exactly a heroic figure."

"Shouldn't you?"

She finished her chocolate in silence, and followed him in silence to his car. They sped up F Street, gay with its morning crowd.

Then at last it came. "Isn't it a wonderful day, Daddy?"

He smiled down at her. "There you go."

"Well, it is wonderful." She fell again into silence, then again bestowed upon him her raptures. "Wouldn't it be dreadful if we had loveless days, Daddy, as well as meatless ones and wheatless?"

That night, after Jean had gone to bed, the Doctor, having dismissed his last patient, came out of his inner office. Hilda, in her white nurse's costume, was busy with the books. He stood beside her desk. His eyes were dancing. "Jean told me about the steak."

"I knew she would—I suppose it was an awful thing to do. But I was hungry, and I hate fish—" She smiled at him lazily, then laughed.

He laughed back. He felt that it would be unbearable for Hilda to go hungry, to spoil her red and white with abstinence.

"My dear girl," he said, "what did you mean when you spoke of going away?"

"Haven't you been thinking of going?"

The color came up in his cheeks. "Yes, but how did you know it?"

"Well, a woman knows. Why don't you make up your mind?"

"There's Jean to think of."

"Emily Bridges could take care of her. And you ought to go. Men are seeing things over there that they'll never see again. And women are."

"If my country needs me—"

Hilda was cold. "I shouldn't go for that. As I told Jean, I am not making any grand stand plays. I should go for all that I get out of it, the experience, the adventure—."

He looked at her with some curiosity. Jean's words of the afternoon recurred to him. "She's a ghoul—"

Yet there was something almost fascinating in her frankness. She tore aside ruthlessly the curtain of self-deception, revealing her motives, as if she challenged him to call them less worthy than his own.

"If I go, it will be because I want to become a better nurse. I like it here, but your practice is necessarily limited. I should get a wider view of things. So would you. There would be new worlds of disease, men in all conditions of nervous shock."

"I know. But I'd hate to think I was going merely for selfish ends."

She shrugged. "Why not that as well as any other?"

He had a smouldering sense of irritation.

"When I am with Jean she makes me feel rather big and fine; when I am with you—" He paused.

"I make you see yourself as you are, a man. She thinks you are more than that."

All his laughter left ham. "It is something to be a hero to one's daughter. Perhaps some day I shall be a little better for her thinking so."

She saw that she had gone too far. "You mustn't take the things I say too seriously."

The bell of the telephone at her elbow whirred. She put the receiver to her ear. "It is General Drake's man; he thinks you'd better come over before you go to bed."

"I was afraid I might have to go. He is in rather bad shape, Hilda."

She packed his bag for him competently, and telephoned for his car. "I'll have a cup of coffee ready for you when you get back," she said, as she stood in the door. "It is going to be a dreadful night."

The streets were icy and the sleet falling. "You'd better have your overshoes," Hilda decided, and went for them.

As he put them on, she stood under the hall light, smiling. "Have you forgiven me?" she asked as he straightened up.

"For telling me the truth? Of course. You take such good care of me, Hilda."

Upstairs in her own room Jean was writing a letter. It was a very pretty room, very fresh and frilly with white dimity and with much pink and pale lavender. The night-light which shone through the rose taffeta petticoats of a porcelain lady was supplemented at the moment by a bed-side lamp which flung a ring of gold beyond Jean's blotter to the edge of the lace spread. For Jean was writing in bed. All day her mind had been revolving around this letter, but she had had no time to write. She had spent the afternoon in the Toy Shop with Emily, and in the evening there had been a Red Cross sale. She had gone to the sale with Ralph Witherspoon and his mother. She had not been able to get out of going. All the time she had talked to Ralph she had thought of Derry. She had rather hoped that he might be there, but he wasn't.

The letter required much thought. She tore up, extravagantly, several sheets of note-paper with tiny embossed thistles at the top. Doctor McKenzie was intensely Scotch, and he was entitled to a crest, but he was also intensely American, and would have none of it. He had designed Jean's note-paper, and it was lovely. But it was also expensive, and it was a shame to waste so much of it on Derry Drake.

The note when it was finished seemed very simple. Just one page in Jean's firm, clear script:

"Dear Mr. Drake:—

"Could you spare me one little minute tomorrow? I shall be at home at four. It is very important—to me at least. Perhaps when you hear what I have to say, it will seem important to you. I hope it may.

"Very sincerely yours,

"JEAN MCKENZIE."

She read it over several times. It seemed very stiff and inadequate. She sealed it and stamped it, then in a panic tore it open for a re-reading. She was oppressed by doubts. Did nice girls ask men to come and see them? Didn't they wait and weary [Transcriber's note: worry?] like Mariana of the Moated Grange—? "He cometh not, she said?"

New times! New manners! She had branded a man as a coward. She had condemned him unheard. She had slighted him, she had listened while others slandered—why should she care what other women had done? Would do? Her way was clear. She owed an apology to Derry Drake, and she would make it.

So with a new envelope, a new stamp, the note was again sealed.

It had to be posted that night. She felt that under no circumstance could she stand the suspense of another day.

She had heard her father go out. Hilda was coming up, the maids were asleep. She waited until Hilda's door was shut, then she slipped out of bed, tucked her toes into a pair of sandals, threw a furry motor coat around her, and sped silently down the stairs. She shrank back as she opened the front door. The sleet rattled on the steps, the pavements were covered with white.

The mail-box was in front of the house. She made a rush for it, dropped in the precious letter, and gained once more the haven of the warm hall.

She was glad to get back to her room. As she settled down among her pillows, she had a great sense of adventure, as if she had travelled far in a few moments.

As a matter of fact, she had made her first real excursion into the land of romance. She found her thoughts galloping.

At the foot of the bed her silver Persian, Polly Ann, lay curled on her own gray blanket.

"Polly Ann," Jean said, "if he doesn't come, I shall hate myself for writing that note."

Polly Ann surveyed her sleepily.

"But it would serve me right if he didn't, Polly Ann."

She turned off the light and tried to sleep. Downstairs the telephone rang. It rang, too, in Hilda's room. Hilda's door opened and shut. She came across the hall and tapped on Jean's door. "May I come in?"

"Yes."

"Your father has just telephoned," Hilda said from the threshold, "that General Drake's nurse is not well, and will have to be taken off the case. I shall have to go in her place. There is a great shortage at the hospital. Will you be afraid to stay alone, or shall I wake up Ellen and have her sleep on the couch in your dressing room?"

"Of course I am not afraid, Hilda. Nothing can happen until father comes back."

As Hilda went away, Jean had a delicious feeling of detachment. She would be alone in the house with her thoughts of Derry.

She got out of bed to say her prayers. With something of a thrill she prayed for Derry's father. She was not conscious as she made her petitions of any ulterior motive. Yet a placated Providence would, she felt sure, see that the General's sickness should not frustrate the plans which she had quite daringly made for his son.



CHAPTER VIII

THE SHADOWED ROOM

Derry had dined that night with his cousin, Margaret Morgan. Margaret's husband was somewhere in France with Pershing's divisions. Margaret was to have news of him this evening, brought by a young English officer, Dawson Hewes, who had been wounded at Ypres, and who had come on a recruiting mission, among his countrymen in America.

The only other guest was to be Drusilla Gray.

Derry had gone over early to have the twilight hour with Margaret's children. There was Theodore, the boy, and Margaret-Mary, on the edge of three. They had their supper at five in the nursery, and after that there was always the story hour, with nurse safely downstairs for her dinner, their mother, lovely in a low-necked gown, and father coming in at the end. For several months their father had not come, and the best they could do was to kiss his picture in the frame with the eagle on it, to put flowers in front of it, and to say their little prayers for the safety of men in battle.

It was Cousin Derry who dropped in now at the evening hour. He was a famous story-teller, and they always welcomed him uproariously.

Margaret Morgan, perhaps better than any other, knew in those days what was in Derry's heart. She knew the things against which he had struggled, and she had rebelled hotly, "Why should he be sacrificed?" she had asked her husband more than once during the three years which had preceded America's entrance into the war. "He wants to be over there driving an ambulance—doing his bit. Aunt Edith always idealized the General, and Derry is paying the price."

"Most women idealize the men they love, honey-girl." Winston Morgan was from the South, and he drew upon its store of picturesque endearments to express his joy and pride in his own Peggy. "And if they didn't where should we be?"

She had leaned her head against him. "I don't need to idealize you," she had said, comfortably, "but the General is different. Aunt Edith made Derry live his father's life, not his own, and it has moulded him into something less than he might have been if he had been allowed more initiative."

Winston had shaken his head. "Discipline is a mighty good thing in the Army, Peggy, and it's a mighty good thing in life. Derry Drake is as hard as steel, and as finely tempered. If he ever does break loose, he'll be all the more dynamic for having held himself back."

Margaret, conceding all that, was yet constrained to pour out upon Derry the wealth of her womanly sympathy. It was perhaps the knowledge of this as well as his devotion to her children which brought him often to her door.

Tonight she was sitting on a low-backed seat in front of the fire with a child on each side of her. She was in white, her dark hair in a simple shining knot, a little pearl heart which had been Captain Morgan's parting gift, her only ornament.

"Go on with your story," he said, as he came in. "I just want to listen and do nothing."

She glanced up at him. He looked tired, unlike himself, depressed.

"Anything the matter?"

"Father isn't well. Dr. McKenzie has taken the case. Richards has gone to the front. Bronson will call me if there are any unfavorable developments."

Margaret-Mary, curled up like a kitten in the curve of Cousin Derry's arm, was exploring his vest pocket. She found two very small squares of Washington taffy wrapped in wax paper, one for herself and one for Teddy. It was Derry's war-time offering. No other candies were permitted by Margaret's patriotism. Her children ate molasses on their bread, maple sugar on their cereal. Her soldier was in France, and there were other soldiers, not one of whom should suffer because of the wanton waste of food by the people who stayed softly at home.

"You tell us a story, Uncle Derry," Teddy pleaded as he ate his taffy.

"I'd rather listen to your mother."

"They are tired of me," Margaret told him.

"We are not ti-yard," her small son enunciated carefully, "but you said you had to fix the f'owers."

"Well, I have. May I turn them over to you, Derry?"

"For a minute. But you must come back."

She came back presently, to find the lights out and only the glow of the fire to illumine faintly the three figures on the sofa. She stood unseen in the door and listened.

"And so the Tin Soldier stood on the shelf where the little boy had put him, and nothing happened in the old, old house. There was just an old, old man, and walls covered with old, old portraits, and knights in armor, and wooden trumpeters carved on the door who blew with all their might, 'Trutter-a-trutt, Trutter-a-trutt'—. But the old man and the portraits and the wooden trumpeters had no thought for the Tin Soldier who stood there on the shelf, alone and longing to go to the war. And at last the Tin Soldier cried out, 'I can't stand it. I want to go to the wars—I want to go to the wars!' But nobody listened or cared."

"Poor 'itte sing," Margaret-Mary crooned.

"If I had been there," Teddy proclaimed, "I'd have put him on the floor and told him to run and run and run!"

"But there was nobody to put him on the floor," said Derry, "so at last the Tin Soldier could stand it no longer. 'I will go to the wars, I will go to the wars,' he cried, and he threw himself down from the shelf."

The story stopped suddenly. "Go on, go on," urged the little voices in the dark.

"Perhaps you think that was the end of it, and that the Tin Soldier ran away to the wars, to help his country and save the world from ruin. But Fate wasn't as kind to him as that. For when the little boy came again to the old house, he looked for the Tin Soldier. But he wasn't on the shelf. And he looked and looked and, the old man looked, and the wooden trumpeters blew out their cheeks, 'Trutter-a-trutt, trutter-a-trutt—where is the Tin Soldier?—trutter-a-trutt—.'

"But they did not find him, for the Tin Soldier had fallen through a crack in the floor, and there he lay as in an open grave."

Drusilla's voice was heard in the lower hall, and the deeper voice of Captain Hewes. Margaret sped down to meet them, leaving the story, reluctantly, in that moment of heart-breaking climax.

When later Derry followed her, she had a chance to say, "I hope you gave it a happy ending."

"Oh, did you hear? Yes. They found him in time to send him away to war. But Hans Andersen didn't end it that way. He knew life."

She stared at him in amazement. Was this the Derry whose supply of cheerfulness had seemed inexhaustible? Whose persistent optimism had been at times exasperating to his friends?

Throughout the evening she was aware of his depression. She was aware, too, of the mistake which she had made in bringing Derry and Captain Hewes together.

The Captain had red hair and a big nose. But he was a gentleman in the fine old English sense; he was a soldier with but one idea, that every physically able man should fight. Every sentence that he spoke was charged with this belief, and every sentence carried a sting for Derry.

More than once Peggy found it necessary to change the subject frantically. Drusilla supplemented her efforts.

But gradually the Captain's manner froze. With a sort of military sixth sense, he felt that he had been asked to break bread and eat salt with a slacker, and he resented it.

After dinner Drusilla sang for them. Sensitive always to atmosphere, she soothed the Captain with old and familiar songs, "Flow gently, sweet Afton," and "Believe me if all those endearing young charms."

Then straight from these to "I'm going to marry 'Arry on the Fifth of January."

"Oh, I say—Harry Lauder," was Captain Hewes' eager comment. "I heard him singing to the chaps in the trenches just before I sailed—a little stocky man in a red kilt. He'd laugh, and you'd want to cry."

Drusilla gave them "Wee Hoose among the Heather," with the touch of pathos which the little man in the red kilt had imparted to it as he had sung it in October in New York before an audience which had wept as it had welcomed him.

"Queer thing," Captain Hewes mused, "what the war has done to him, set him preaching and all that."

"Oh, it isn't queer," Margaret was eager. "That is one of the things the war is doing, bringing men back to—God—" A sob caught in her throat.

Drusilla's hands strayed upon the keys, and into the Battle Hymn of the Republic.

"I have seen Him in the watch fires of a hundred circling camps, They have builded Him an altar in the evening dews and damps, I can read His righteous sentence by the dim and flaring lamps, His day is marching on—"

It was an old tune, but the words were new to Captain Hewes—as the girl chanted them, in that repressed voice that yet tore the heart out of him.

"He has sounded forth the trumpet that shall never call retreat, He is sifting out the hearts of men before His judgment seat, Oh, be swift, my soul, to answer Him, be jubilant my feet, Our God is marching on—"

The Captain sat on the edge of his chair. His face was illumined.

"By Jove," he ejaculated, "that's topping!"

Drusilla stood up with her back to the piano, and sang without music.

"In the beauty of the lilies, Christ was born across the sea— With the glory in His bosom that transfigures you and me, As He died to make men holy, let us die to make men free, While God is marching on—"

She wore a gown of sheer dull blue, there was a red rose in her hair—her white arms, her white neck, the blue and red, youth and fire, strength and purity.

When she finished the room was very still. The big Englishman had no words for such a moment. The music had swept him up to unexpected heights of emotion. While Drusilla sang he had glimpsed for the first time the meaning of democracy, he had seen, indeed, in a great and lofty sense, for the first time—America.

Among the shadows a young man shrank in his seat. His vision was not of Democracy, but of a freezing night—of a ragged old voice rising from the blackness of a steep ravine—

"Oh, be swift, my soul—to answer—Him— Be jubilant my feet—"

Why had Drusilla chosen that of all songs? Oh, why had she sung at all?

A maid came in to say that Mr. Drake was wanted at the telephone. The message was from Dr. McKenzie. The General was much worse. It might be well for Derry to come home.

So Derry, with a great sense of relief, got away from the frigid Captain, and from the flaming Drusilla, and from Peggy with her flushed air of apology, and went out into the stormy night. He had preferred to walk, although his shoes were thin. "It isn't far," he had said when Margaret expostulated, "and I'll send my car for Drusilla and Captain Hewes."

The sleet drove against his face. His feet were wet before he reached the first corner, the wind buffeted him. But he felt none of it. He was conscious only of his depression and of his great dread of again entering the big house where a sick man lay in a lacquered bed and where a painted lady smiled on the stairs. Where there was nothing alive, nothing young, nothing with lips to welcome him, or with hands to hold out to him.

He found when at last he arrived that the Doctor had sent for Hilda Merritt.

She came presently, in her long blue cloak and small blue bonnet. Hilda made no mistakes in the matter of clothes. She realized the glamour which her nurse's uniform cast over her. In evening dress she was slightly commonplace. In ordinary street garb not an eye would have been turned upon her, but the nun's blue and white of her uniform added the required spiritual effect to her rather full-blown beauty.

As she passed the painted lady at the head of the stairway she gave her a slight glance. Then on and up she went to her appointed task.

"It is pneumonia," Dr. McKenzie told Derry; "that's why I wanted Miss Merritt. She is very experienced, and in these days of war it is hard to get good nurses."

Derry found his voice shaking. "Is there any danger?"

"Naturally, at his age. But I think we are going to pull him through."

Derry went into the shadowed room. His father was breathing heavily. Something clutched at the boy's heart—the fear of the Thing which lurked in the darkness—a chill and sinister figure with a skeleton hand.

He could not have his father die. He would feel as if his thoughts had killed him—a murderer in intention if not in deed. Not thus must the Obstacle be removed. He raised haggard eyes to the Doctor's face. "You—you mustn't think that I store things up against him. He's all I have."

The Doctor's keen glance appraised him. "Don't get morbid over it; he has everything in his favor—and Miss Merritt is famous in such cases."

Hilda took his praise with downcast eyes. Her manner with the Doctor when others were present was professionally deferential. It was only when they were alone that the nurse was submerged in the woman.

With her bonnet off and a white cap in its place, she moved about the room. "I shall be very comfortable," she said, when Derry inquired if anything could be done for her.

"We haven't any women about the place but Cook," he explained. "She has been in our family forever—"

"I'll put a day nurse on tomorrow," the Doctor said, "but I want Hilda with him at night; she can call me up if there's any change, and I'll come right over."

When the Doctor had gone, Derry, seeking his room, found Muffin waiting. Bronson bustled in to see that his young master got out of his wet clothes and into a hot bath. "All the time the Doctor was talking to you, I was worrying about your shoes. Your feet are soaked, sir. Whatever made you walk in the rain?"

"I couldn't ride—I couldn't."

The old man on his knees removing the wet shoes looked up. "Restless, sir?"

"Yes. There are times, Bronson, when I want my mother."

He could say it in this room to Bronson and Muffin—to the gray old dog and the gray old man who adored him.

Bronson put him to bed, settled Muffin among his blankets in a basket by the hot water pipes, opened the windows wide, said "God bless you," and went away.

"Sweet dreams, Muffin," said Derry from the big bed.

The old dog whuffed discreetly.

It was their nightly ceremony.

The sleet came down in golden streaks against the glow of the street lights. Derry lay watching it, and it was a long time before he slept. Not since his mother's death had he been so weighed down with heaviness.

He kept seeing Jean with her head up, declining to dance with him; on the high stool at the confectioner's, her eyes cold above her chocolate; the English Captain and his contemptuous stare; Alma, basely excusing him; Drusilla, in her red and blue and white—singing—!

He waked in the morning with a sore throat. Young Martin came in to light the fire and draw the water for his bath. Later Bronson brought his breakfast and the mail.

"You'd better stay in bed, Mr. Derry."

"I think I shall. How is Dad?"

"The nurse says he is holding his own."

"I am glad of that."

Bronson, feeding warm milk and toast to Muffin, ventured an opinion, "I am not sure that I like the nurse, sir."

"Why not?"

"She's not exactly a lady, and she's not exactly a nurse."

"I see." Derry, having glanced over a letter or two, had picked up an envelope with embossed thistles on the flap. "But she is rather pretty, Bronson."

"Pretty is as pretty does," sententiously.

Silence. Bronson looked across at the young man propped up among the pillows. He was rereading the letter with the thistles on the flap. The strained look had gone out of his eyes, and his lips were smiling.

"I think I'll get up."

"Changed your mind, sir?"

"Yes." He threw back the covers. "I've a thousand things to do."

But there was just one thing which he was going to do which stood out beyond all others. Neither life nor death nor flood nor fire should keep him from presenting himself at four o'clock at Jean McKenzie's door, in response to the precious note which in a moment had changed the world for him.



CHAPTER IX

ROSE-COLOR!

Jean found the day stretching out ahead of her in a series of exciting events. At the breakfast table her father told her that Hilda would stay on General Drake's case, and that she had better have Emily Bridges up for a visit.

"I don't like to have you alone at night, if I am called away."

"It will be heavenly, Daddy, to have Emily—"

And how was he to know that there were other heavenly things to happen? She had resolved that if Derry came, she would tell her father afterwards. But he might not come, so what was the use of being premature?

She sallied down to the Toy Shop in high feather. "You are to stay with us, Emily."

"Oh, am I? How do you know that I can make it convenient?"

"But you will, darling."

Jean's state of mind was beatific. She painted Lovely Dreams with a touch of inspiration which resulted in a row of purple camels: "Midnight on the Desert," Jean called them.

"Oh, Emily," she said, "we must have them in the window on Christmas morning, with the Wise Men and the Star—"

Emily, glancing at the face above the blue apron, was struck by the radiance of it.

"Is it because Hilda is away?" she asked.

"Is what—?"

"Your—rapture."

Jean laughed. "It is because Hilda is away, and other things. But I can't tell you now."

Then for fear Emily might be hurt by her secrecy, she flew to kiss her and again call her "Darling."

At noon she put on her hat and ran home, or at least her heart ran, and when she reached the house she sought the kitchen.

"I am having company for tea, Ellen—at four. And I want Lady-bread-and-butter, and oh, Ellen, will you have time for little pound cakes?"

She knew of course that pound cakes were—verboten. She felt, however, that even Mr. Hoover might sanction a fatted calf in the face of this supreme event.

She planned that she would receive Derry in the small drawing room. It was an informal room which had been kept by her mother for intimate friends. There was a wide window which faced west, a davenport in deep rose velvet, some chairs to match, and there were always roses in an old blue bowl.

Jean knew the dress she was going to wear in this room—of blue to match the bowl, with silver lace, and a girdle of pink brocade.

Alone in her room with Polly-Ann to watch proceedings, she got out the lovely gown.

"Oh, I do want to be pretty, Polly-Ann," she said with much wistfulness.

Yet when she was all hooked and snapped into it, she surveyed herself with some dissatisfaction in the mirror.

"Why not?" she asked the mirror. "Why shouldn't I wear it?"

The mirror gave back a vision of beauty—but behind that vision in the depths of limitless space Jean's eyes discerned something which made her change her gown. Quite soberly she got herself into a little nun's frock of gray with collars and cuffs of transparent white, and above it all was the glory of her crinkled hair.

Neither then nor afterwards could she analyze her reasons for the change. Perhaps sub-consciously she was perceiving that this meeting with Derry Drake was to be a serious and stupendous occasion. Throughout the world the emotions of men and women were being quickened to a pace set by a mighty conflict. Never again would Jean McKenzie laugh or cry over little things. She would laugh and cry, of course, but back of it all would be that sense of the world's travail and tragedy, made personal by her own part in it.

Julia, the second maid, was instructed to show Mr. Drake into the little drawing room. Jean came down early with her knitting, and sat on the deep-rose Davenport. The curtains were not drawn. There was always the chance of a sunset view. Julia was to turn on the light when she brought in the tea.

There was the whir of a bell, the murmur of voices. Jean sat tense. Then as her caller entered, she got somewhat shakily on her feet.

But the man in the door was not Derry Drake!

In his intrusive and impertinent green, pinched-in as to waist, and puffed-out as to trousers, his cheeks red with the cold, his brown eyes bright with eagerness, Ralph Witherspoon stood on the threshold.

"Of all the good luck," he said, "to find you in."

She shook hands with him and sat down.

"I thought you had gone back to Bay Shore. You said yesterday you were going."

"I got my orders in the nick of time. We are to go to Key West. I am to join the others on the way down."

"How soon?"

He sat at the other end of the davenport. "In three days, and anything can happen in three days."

He moved closer. She had a sense of panic. Was he going to propose to her again, in this room which she had set aside so sacredly for Derry Drake?

"Won't you have some tea?" she asked, desperately. "I'll have Julia bring it in."

"I'd rather talk."

But she had it brought, and Julia, wheeling in the tea-cart, offered a moment's reprieve. And Ralph ate the Lady-bread-and-butter, and the little pound cakes with the nuts and white frosting which had been meant for Derry, and then he walked around the tea-cart and took her hand, and for the seventh time since he had met her he asked her to marry him.

"But I don't love you." She was almost in tears.

"You don't know what love is—I'll teach you."

"I don't want to be taught."

"You don't know what it means to be taught—"

Jean had a stifling sense as of some great green tree bending down to crush her. She put out her hand to push it away.

In the silence a bell whirred—.

Derry Drake, ushered in by Julia, saw the room in the rosy glow of the lamp. He saw Ralph Witherspoon towering insolently in his aviator's green. He saw Jean, blushing and perturbed. The scene struck cold against the heat of his anticipation.

He sat down in one of the rose-colored chairs, and Julia brought more tea for him, more Lady-bread-and-butter, more pound cakes with nuts and frosting.

Ralph was frankly curious. He was also frankly jealous. He was aware that Derry had met Jean for the first time at his mother's dinner dance. And Derry's millions were formidable. It did not occur to Ralph that Derry, without his millions, was formidable. Ralph's idea of a man's attractiveness for women was founded on his belief in their admiration of good looks, and their liking for the possession of, as he would himself have expressed it, "plenty of pep" and "go." From Ralph's point of view Derry Drake was not handsome, and he was utterly unaware that back of Derry's silver-blond slenderness and apparent languidness were banked fires which could more than match his own.

And there was this, too, of which he was unconscious, that Derry's millions meant nothing to Jean. Had he remained the shabby son of the shabby old man in the Toy Shop, her heart would still have followed him.

So, fatuously hopeful, Ralph stayed. He stayed until five, until half-past five. Until a quarter of six.

And he talked of the glories of war!

Derry grew restless. As he sat in the rose-colored chair, he fingered a tassel which caught back one of the curtains of the wide window. It was a silk tassel, and he pulled at one strand of it until it was flossy and frayed. He was unconscious of his work of destruction, unconscious that Jean's eyes, lifted now and then from her knitting, noted his fingers weaving in and out of the rosy strands.

Ralph talked on. With seeming modesty he spoke of the feats of other men, yet none the less it was Ralph they saw, poised like a bird at incredible heights, looping the loop, fearless, splendid—beating the air with strong wings.

Six o'clock, and at last Ralph rose. Even then he hesitated and hung back, as if he expected that Derry might go with him. But Derry, stiff and straight beside the rose-colored chair, bade him farewell!

And now Derry was alone with Jean!

They found themselves standing close together in front of the fire. The garment of coldness and of languor which had seemed to enshroud Derry had dropped from him. The smile which he gave Jean was like warm wine in her veins.

"Well—?"

"I asked you to come—to say—that I am,—sorry—," her voice breaking. "Daddy told me that he knew why—you couldn't fight—"

"I didn't intend that he should tell."

"He didn't," eagerly, "not your reasons. He said it was a—confidence, and he couldn't break his word. But he knew that you were brave. That the things the world is saying are all wrong. Oh, I ought to go down on my knees."

Her face was white, her eyes deep wells of tears.

"It is I," he said, very low, "who should be on my knees—do you know what it means to me to have you tell me this?"

"I wasn't sure that I ought to write. To some men I couldn't have written—"

His face lighted. "When your note came—I can't tell you what it meant to me. I shouldn't like to think of what this day would have been for me if you had not written. Everybody is calling me—a coward. You know that. You heard Witherspoon just now pitying me, not in words, but his manner."

"Oh, Ralph," how easily she disposed of him. "Ralph crows, like a—rooster."

They looked at each other and tried to laugh. But they were not laughing in their hearts.

He lifted her hand and kissed it—then he stood well away from her, anchoring himself again to the silken tassel. "Now that you know a part," he said, from that safe distance, "I'd like to tell you all of it, if I may."

As he talked her fingers were busy with her knitting, but there came moments when she laid it down and looked up at him with eyes that mirrored his own earnestness.

"It—it hasn't been easy," he said in conclusion, "but—but if you will be my friend, nothing will be hard."

She tried to speak—was shaken as if by a strong wind, and her knitting went up as a shield.

"My dear, you are crying," he said, and was on his knees beside her.

And now they were caught in the tide of that mighty wave which was sweeping the world!

When at last she steadied herself, he was again anchored to the rose-colored tassel.

"You—you must forgive me—but—it has been so good to talk it out—to some one—who cared. I had never dreamed until that night in the Toy Shop of anybody—like you. Of anybody so—adorable. When your note came this morning, I couldn't believe it. But now I know it is true. And that night of Cinderella you were so—heavenly."

It was a good thing that Miss Emily came in at that moment—for his eloquence was a burning flood, and Jean was swept up and on with it.

The entrance of Emily, strictly tailored and practical, gave them pause.

"You remember Mr. Drake, don't you, Emily?"

Emily did, of course. But she had not expected to see him here. She held out her hand. "I remember that he was coming back for more of your Lovely Dreams."

"I want all of her dreams," said Derry, and something in the way that he said it took Miss Emily's breath away. "Please don't sell them to anyone else. You have a wholesale order from me."

Miss Emily looked from one to the other. She was conscious of something which touched the stars—something which all her life she had missed, something which belongs to youth and ecstasy.

"Wholesale orders are not in my line," she said. "You can settle that with Jean."

She surveyed the tea-wagon. "I'm starved. And if I eat I shall spoil my dinner."

"I can ring for hot water, Emily, and there are more of the pound cakes."

"My dear, no. I must go upstairs and dress. Your father sent for my bag, and Julia says it is in my room."

She bade Derry a cheerful good-bye, and left them alone.

"I must go, too," said Derry, and took Jean's hand. He stood looking down at her. "May I come tomorrow?"

"Oh,—yes—"

"There's one thing that I should like more than anything, if we could go to church together—to be thankful that—that we've found each other—"

Tears in the shining eyes!

"Why are you crying?"

"Because it is so—sweet."

"Then you'll go?"

"I'd love it."

He dropped her hand and got away. She was little and young, so divinely innocent. He felt that he must not take unfair advantage of that mood of exaltation.

He drove straight downtown and ordered flowers for her. Remembering the nun's dress, he sent violets in a gray basket, with a knot on the handle of heavenly blue.

The flowers came while Jean was at dinner. Emily was in Hilda's place, a quiet contrast in her slenderness and modest black to Hilda's opulence. Dr. McKenzie had not had time to dress.

"I am so busy, Emily."

"But you love the busy-ness, don't you? I can't imagine you without the hours crammed full."

"Just now I wish that I could push it away as Richards pushed it—"

Jean looked up. "But Dr. Richards went to France, Daddy."

"I envy him."

"Oh, do you—?" Then her flowers came, and she forgot everything else.

The Doctor whistled as Julia set the basket in front of Jean. "Ralph is generous."

Jean had opened the attached envelope and was reading a card. A wave of self-conscious color swept over her cheeks. "Ralph didn't send them. It—it was Derry Drake."

"Drake? How did that happen?"

"He was here this afternoon for tea, and Ralph, and Emily—only Emily was late, and the tea was cold—"

"So you've made up?"

"We didn't have to make up much, Daddy, did we?" mendaciously.

Miss Emily came to the rescue. "He seems very nice."

"Splendid fellow. But I am not sure that I want him sending flowers to my daughter. I don't want anyone sending flowers to her."

Miss Emily took him up sharply. "That's your selfishness. Life has always been a garden where you have wandered at will. And now you want to shut the gate of that garden against your daughter."

"Well, there are flowers that I shouldn't care to have her pluck."

"Don't you know her well enough to understand that she'll pluck only the little lovely blooms?"

His eyes rested on Jean's absorbed face. "Yes, thank God. And thank you, too, for saying it, Emily."

After dinner they sat in the library. Doctor McKenzie on one side of the fire with his cigar, Emily on the other side with her knitting. Jean between them in a low chair, a knot of Derry's violets fragrant against the gray of her gown, her fingers idle.

"Why aren't you knitting?" the Doctor asked.

"I don't have to set a good example to Emily."

"And you do to Hilda?" He threw back his head and laughed.

"You needn't laugh. Isn't it comfy with Emily?"

"It is." He glanced at the slender black figure. He was still feeling the fineness of the thing she had said about Jean. "But when she is here I am jealous."

"Oh, Daddy."

"And I am never jealous of Hilda. If you had Emily all the time you'd love her better than you do me."

He chuckled at their hot eyes. "If you are teasing," Jean told him, "I'll forgive you. But Emily won't, will you, Emily?"

"No." Emily's voice was gay, and he liked the color in her cheeks. "He doesn't deserve to be forgiven. Some day he is going to be devoured by a green-eyed monster, like a bad little boy in a Sunday School story."

Her needles clicked, and her eyes sparkled. There was no doubt that there was a sprightliness about Emily that was stimulating.

"But one's only daughter, Emily. Isn't jealousy pardonable?"

"Not in you."

"Why not?"

"Well," with obvious reluctance, "you're too big for it."

"Oh," he was more pleased than he was willing to admit, "did you hear that, Jean?"

But Jean, having drifted away from them, came back with, "I am going to church with him tomorrow."

"Him? Whom?"

"Derry Drake, Daddy, and may I bring him home to dinner?"

"Do you think a man like that goes begging for invitations? He has probably been asked to a dozen places to eat his turkey."

"He can't eat it at a dozen places, Daddy. And anyhow I should like to ask him. I—I think he is lonely—"

"A man with millions is never lonely."

She did not attempt to argue. She felt that her father could not possibly grasp the truth about Derry Drake. Her own understanding of his need had been a blinding, whirling revelation. He had said, "I wanted some one—who cared—." Not for a moment since then had the world been real to her. She had seemed in the center of a golden-lighted sphere, where Derry's voice spoke to her, where Derry's smile warmed her, where Derry, a silver-crested knight, knelt at her feet.

Julia came in to say that Miss Jean was wanted at the telephone.

Miraculously Derry's voice came over the wire. Was she going to the dance at the Willard? The one for the benefit of the Eye and Ear Hospital? The President and his wife would be there—the only ball they had attended this season—everybody would be there. Could he come for Jean and her father? And he'd bring Drusilla and Marion Gray. She knew Drusilla?

Jean on tiptoe. Oh, yes. But she was not sure about her father.

"But you—you—?"

"I'll ask."

She flew on winged feet and explained excitedly.

"Tonight? Tonight, Jean?"

"Yes, Daddy."

"But what time is it?"

"Only ten. He'll come at eleven—"

"But you can't leave Emily alone, dear."

"Emily won't mind—darling—will you, Emily?"

"Of course not. I am often alone."

It was said quietly, without bitterness, but Dr. McKenzie was quite suddenly and unreasonably moved by the thought of all that Emily had missed. He felt it utterly unfair that she should sit alone by an empty hearth while he and Jean frivolled. He had never thought of Hilda by an empty hearth—and she had been often alone—but there was this which made the difference, he would not have asked Hilda to meet his daughter's friends. She had her place in his household, but it was not the place which Emily filled.

Yet he missed her. He missed her blond picturesqueness at the dinner table, her trim whiteness as she served him in his office.

He came back to the question of Emily. "You can tell Drake we will go, if Emily can accompany us."

"But, Doctor, I'd rather not."

"Why not?"

"I'm not included in the invitation."

"Don't be self-conscious."

"And I haven't anything to wear."

"You never looked better than you do at this moment. And Jean can get you that scarf of her mother's with the jet and spangles."

"The peacocky one—oh, yes, Daddy." Jean danced back to the telephone.

Derry was delighted to include Miss Bridges. "Bring a dozen if you wish."

"I don't want a dozen. I want just Daddy and Emily."

"And me?"

"Of course—silly—"

Laughter singing along the wire. "May I come now?"

"I have to change my dress."

"In an hour, then?"

"Yes."

"I can't really believe that we are going together!"

"Together—"



CHAPTER X

A MAN WITH MONEY

White and silver for Jean, the peacocky scarf making Emily shine with the best of them, Dr. McKenzie called away at the last moment, and promising to join them later; Derry catching his breath when he saw his violets among Jean's laces; Drusilla wondering a little at this transfigured Derry; Marion Gray settling down to the comfort of a chat with Emily—what had these to do with a Tin Soldier on a shelf?

"How is your father, Derry?"

"Better, Drusilla. He has a fine nurse. Dr. McKenzie sent her."

"And I have Emily," Jean sang from the corner of the big car where Derry had her penned in, with the fragrance of her violets sweeping over him as he sat next to her. "I want Emily always, but Daddy has to have a nurse in the office, and Emily won't give up her toys. And in the meantime Hilda and I are ready to scratch each other's eyes out. Please keep her as long as you can on your father's case, Mr. Drake."

"Say 'Derry,'" he commanded under cover of the light laughter of the women.

"Not before—-everybody—"

"Whisper it, then."

"Derry, Derry."

His pulses pounded. During the rest of the drive, he spoke to his other guests and seemed to listen, but he heard nothing—nothing but the whisper of that beloved voice.

As Derry had said, all the world of Washington was at the ball. The President and his wife in a flag-draped box, she in black with a turquoise fan, he towering a little above her, more than President in these autocratic days of war. They looked down on men in the uniforms of the battling world—Scot and Briton and Gaul—in plaid and khaki and horizon blue—.

They looked down on women knitting.

Mrs. Witherspoon and a party of young people sat in a box adjoining Derry's. Ralph was there and Alma Drew, and Alma was more than ever lovely in gold-embroidered tulle.

Ralph knew what had happened when he saw Jean dancing with Derry. There was no mistaking the soft raptures of the youthful pair. In the days to come Ralph was to suffer wounds, but none to tear his heart like this. And so when he danced with Jean a little later he did not spare her.

"A man with money always gets what he wants."

"I don't know what you mean."

"I think you do. You are going to marry Derry Drake."

She shrank at this. She had in her meetings with Derry never looked beyond the bliss of the moment. To have Ralph's rough fingers tearing at the veil of her future was revolting.

She breathed quickly. "I shan't dance with you, if you speak of it again."

"You shall dance with me," grimly, "this moment is my own—"

She was like wax in his strong arms. "Oh, how dare you." She was cold with auger. "I want to stop."

"And I could dance forever. That's the irony of it—that I cannot make you. But if I had Drake's money, I'd make you."

"Do you think it is his money?"

"Perhaps not. But the world will think it."

"If—if he wanted me, I'd marry him if he were a beggar in the streets."

"Has it gone as far as that? But you wouldn't marry a beggar. A troubadour beneath your balcony, yes. But not a beggar. You'd want him silken and blond and singing, and staying at home while other men fought—"

She stopped at once. "If you knew what you were talking about; I'd never speak to you again. But because I was fool enough once to believe that Derry Drake was a coward, I am going to forgive you. But I shall not dance with you again; ever—"

Making her way back alone to the box, she saw with a throb of relief that her father had joined Emily and Marion Gray.

He uttered a quick exclamation as she came up. "What's the matter, daughter?"

Her throat was dry. "I can't tell you now—there are too many people. It was Ralph. I hate him, Daddy."

"My dear—"

"I do."

"But why?"

"Please, I don't want to talk about it—wait until we get home."

Looking out over the heads of the swaying crowd, she saw that Derry was dancing with Alma Drew. And it was Alma who had said at the Witherspoon dinner, "Everybody will forgive a man with money."

And that was what Ralph had thought of her, that she was like Alma—that money could buy her—that she would sell the honor of her country for gold—.

But worse than any hurt of her own was the hurt of the thing for Derry. Ralph Witherspoon had dared to point a finger of scorn at him—other people had dared—

She suffered intensely, not as a child, but as a woman.

Alma, out on the floor, was saying to Derry, "I saw you dancing with Jean McKenzie. She's a quaint little duck."

"Not a duck, Alma," he was smiling, "a white dove—or a silver swan." The look that he sent across the room to Jean was a revelation.

Like Ralph, she grew hateful. "So that's it? Well, a man with money can get anything."

He had no anger for her. Jean might blaze in his defense, but his own fires were not to be fanned by any words of Alma Drew. If he lost his fortune, Jean would still care for him. It was fore-ordained, as fixed as the stars.

So he went back to her, and when she saw him coming, the burden of her distress fell from her. The world became once more hers and Derry's, with everybody else shut out. When they had supper with the Witherspoon party joining them, and Ralph palely repentant beside her, she even, to the utter bewilderment of her father, smiled at him, and talked as if their quarrel had never been.

Drusilla watched her with more than a tinge of envy. She was aware that her own vivid charm was shadowed and eclipsed by the white flame of Jean's youth and innocence. "And he loves her," she thought with a tug of her heartstrings; "he loves her, and there'll never be anything like it for him again."

She sat rather silently between Captain Hewes and Dr. McKenzie. Dr. McKenzie had always admired Drusilla, but tonight his attention was rather more than usual fixed upon her by a remark which Captain Hewes had made when the two men had stood alone together watching the dancers. "I have seen very little of American women—but to me Drusilla Gray seems the supreme type."

"She is very attractive."

"She is more than that. She is inspiring, the embodiment of your best ideals. When she sings one wonders that all men have not fought for democracy."

That was something to say of a woman. Doctor McKenzie wondered if it could be said of his own daughter. Set side by side with Drusilla, Jean seemed a childish creature, unstable, swayed by the emotion of the moment. Yet her fire matched Drusilla's, her dreams outran Drusilla's dreams.

Two officers passed the table.

"How any man can keep out of it," Drusilla said. "Some day I shall put on a uniform and pass for a boy—"

"Why not go over as you are?"

"They won't let me now. But some day they will. I can drive a car—there ought to be a place for me."

"There is one for me," he said, "and my decision must be made tonight. They are asking me to head a hospital staff in France. A letter came this morning, and I've got to answer it."

Her eyes went to the flame-white maiden on the other side of the table. "What does Jean say?"

"I haven't asked her. She wouldn't keep me back. But I am all she has, and it would hurt."

"It would hurt. But you are not all that she has—you might as well try to sweep back the sea as to stop what is going on over there. I have been sitting here green with envy. Oh, if love might only come to me like that."

"Like what?"

"Heaven-sent—never a doubt, never a speculation; just knowing and believing—souls stripped bare of all pretence."

How splendid she was—how beautiful! He bent down to her. "Why shouldn't it come to you?"

"Men don't love me that way. They admire and respect and then love. But Jean? She's a moon maiden, luring them to—madness." She smiled up at him.

"Captain Hewes says you are the supreme type—the perfect American."

"Yes, but he thinks of me as a type. Some day perhaps he will think of me as a woman."

She brought the conversation back to Jean. "You need not let the thought of her loneliness trouble you."

"You think then that I am going to lose her?"

"You have lost her already."

Sparks burned in the Doctor's eyes. "I don't believe it. She has known him a few days—and I've given her my whole life."

"'Forsaking all others,'" murmured Drusilla.

"Yet she loves me."

"It isn't that she loves you less—she loves him more."

"Don't," he lifted his hand. "I am not sure that I can stand it."

"It makes your way clear. That's why I have said it. There will be nothing now to keep you back from France."

Once upon a time she had said to Derry, "I can feel things, and I can make others feel." She had, perhaps, tonight, been a little cruel, but she had been cruel with a purpose.

All the way home Doctor McKenzie was very silent. When he kissed his daughter before she went upstairs, he held her close and smoothed her hair, but not a word did he say of the thing which had come to him.

He asked Emily, however, to wait a moment. "I have a letter to answer. I should like your advice."

Wondering a little, she sat down by the fire. The peacocky scarf gave out glittering lights of blue and green. She was tired and there were shadows under her eyes.

He came at once to his proposition. "I am thinking of going to France, Emily. If I do, can you stay with Jean?"

She turned her startled gaze upon him. "To France? Why?"

He told her. "They have been writing to me for weeks, and now the moment for my decision has come. I haven't said anything to Jean. But she won't keep me back. You know how she feels. But unless you can come, I can't leave her."

"I should have to be all day in my shop."

"I know, but you could be here in the evening and at night, and she could, of course, be with you in the shop, she likes that—and it would keep her from brooding. Or, if you will give up the shop, I should like to make it financially possible for you, Emily."

She shook her head. "No. You will be coming back, and then my occupation would be gone." She hesitated. "But if I come—what of Hilda?"

"She may decide to go over, too, as a nurse. We work well together."

She was silent, searching for the words which she felt that she ought to say. So that was it? They would go together, and the tongues of the world would wag. And Hilda would know that they were wagging, and would not care. But he, with his mind on bigger things, would never know, and would blunder unseeing into the net which was set for him. She felt that she ought to warn him, that the good friendship which existed between them demanded it. Yet it was a hard thing to say, and she hated it. So the moment passed.

It was he who spoke first—of Jean and Derry. "What do you think of it, Emily?"

"He is very much in love with her."

"And Jean?"

"Oh, I think you know. You saw her tonight."

He felt a sudden sense of age and loneliness. "She won't miss me, then?"

"Do you think that anyone could make up to your little Jean for the loss of her father?"

He covered his face with his hand. "You are feeling it like that?" she asked, gently.

"Yes. She is all I have, Emily. And I am jealous—desperately—desperately."

She searched for words to comfort him, and at last they came. "She will be very proud of her Daddy in France."

"Do you think she will?"

"I know it."

"And yet—I am not really worthy of all that she gives—"

She leaned forward, her white hands in her lap. Jean's comment echoed once more in his ears. "I like Emily's hands much better than Hilda's." They seemed, indeed, to represent all that was lovely in Emily, her refinement, her firmness, her gentle spirit.

"Bruce," she said—she rarely called him that—"your dear wife would never have loved you if you hadn't been worthy of love."

"I need her—to hold me to my best."

"Hold yourself to it, Bruce—" She stood up. "I must go to bed, and so must you. We have busy days before us."

He spoke impulsively. "You are a good woman, Emily—there's no one in the world that I would trust to stay with Jean but you."

She smiled a little wistfully as she went upstairs. She had perhaps comforted him, but she had left unsaid the words she should have spoken. "You must not take Hilda with you. If you take her with you, will your Jean be proud of her Daddy in France?"



CHAPTER XI

HILDA WEARS A CROWN

At two o'clock on Thanksgiving morning the light burned low in the General's room. Hilda, wide awake, was reading. Derry stopped at the door.

She rose at once and went to him.

"Is he all right, Miss Merritt?"

"Yes. He's sound asleep."

"Then you think he's better?"

"Much better."

"Good. I hope you can stay on the case. Dr. McKenzie says it is all because of your splendid care of him. I just left McKenzie, by the way. I took him and his daughter to the ball at the Willard. We had a corking time."

Her eyes saw a change in him. This was not the listless Derry with whom she had talked the day before—here were flushed cheeks and shining eyes—gay youth and gladness—.

"A corking time," Derry reiterated. "The President was there, and his wife—and we danced a lot—and—" he caught himself up. "Well, good-night, Miss Merritt."

"Good-night." She went back to the shadowed room.

Bronson, following Derry, came back in a half hour with a dry, "Is there anything I can do for you, Miss Merritt?" and then the house was still.

And now Hilda was alone with the old man in the lacquered bed. There would be no interruptions until morning. It was the moment for which she had waited ever since the hour when the General had sent her into his wife's room for a miniature of Derry, which was locked in the safe.

The suite which had belonged to Mrs. Drake consisted of three rooms—a sitting room, a bedroom and a sun-parlor which had been Derry's nursery. Nothing had been changed since her death. Every day a maid cleaned and dusted, and at certain seasons the clothes in the presses were brushed and aired and put back again. In a little safe in the wall were jewels, and the key was on the General's ring. He had given the key to Hilda when he had sent her for the miniature. His fever had been high, and he had not been quite himself. Even a nurse with a finer sense of honor might have argued, however, that her patient must be obeyed. So she knew now where his treasure was kept—behind a Chinese scroll, which when rolled up revealed the panel which hid the safe.

Hilda had never worn a jewel of value in her life. She possessed, it is true, a few trinkets, a gold ring with her monogram engraved in it, a string of Roman pearls, and a plain wrist watch. But such brilliance as that which met her startled eyes when she had first looked into the safe was beyond anything conceived by her rather limited imagination.

She opened the door between the rooms quietly, and went in, leaving a crack that she might hear any movement on the part of her patient. She crossed the sitting room in the dark. Reaching the bedroom she pulled the chain of the lamp, then set a screen to hide any ray of light which might escape.

The room was furnished with a feeling for delicate color—gold and ivory—Japanese prints—pale silks and crepes—a bit of jade—a cabinet inlaid with mother-of-pearl. But Hilda's eyes were not for these. Indeed, she knew nothing of their value, nothing, indeed, of the value of the Chinese scroll which so effectually hid the panel in the wall.

Within the safe was a large velvet box, and several smaller ones. It was from the big box that Hilda had taken the miniature, and it contained also the crown which she yearned to wear.

She called it a crown! It was a tiara of diamonds, peaked up to a point in front. There was, also, the wide collar of pearls with the diamond slides which had been worn by the painted lady on the stairs. In the smaller boxes were more pearls, long strings of them; sapphires like a midnight sky, opals, fire in a mist; rubies, emeralds—. They should have been locked in a vault at the General's bank, but he had wanted nothing taken away, nothing disturbed. Yet with that touch of fever upon him he had given the key to Hilda.

She took off her cap and turned in the neck of her white linen gown. The pearl collar was a bit small for her, but she managed to snap the three slides. She set the sparkling circlet on her head.

Then she stood back and surveyed herself in the oval mirror!

Gone was the Hilda Merritt whom she had known, and in her place was a queen with a crown! She smiled at her reflection and nodded. For once she was swayed from her stillness and stolidity. She loaded her long hands with rings, and held them to her cheeks; then, struck by the contrast of her white linen sleeve, she rummaged in one of the big closets, and threw on the bed a drift of exquisite apparel.

The gowns were all too small for her, but there was a cloak of velvet and ermine. The General's wife had worn it to the White House dinner over the gown in which she had been painted. Hilda drew the cloak about her shoulders, and laughed noiselessly. She could look like this, and she had never known it! But now that she knew—!

There was the soft click of the telephone in the General's room. Fearful lest the sound should waken her patient, she tore off the tiara, turned up the neck of her dress to hide the shining collar, dropped the cloak, pulled the chain of the lamp, then sped breathless to the shadowed room.

Dr. McKenzie was at the other end of the wire.

"I am coming over, Hilda."

"You need not,"—her voice was a whisper—"he is sound asleep."

"I want to see you for a moment. It is very important."

She hesitated. "It is very late."

"Has young Drake arrived?"

"Yes. He has gone to bed."

"I'll be there in ten minutes. You can meet me downstairs."

The General stirred. "Miss Merritt."

She hung up the receiver and went to him at once.

"Has the Doctor come?"

"No. But he has just telephoned. He will be here shortly."

His sick old eyes surveyed her. "I never saw you before without your cap—"

"No."

"You are very pretty."

She smiled down at him. "It is nice of you to say it."

"Don't wear your cap again, I don't like uniforms for women."

"But when I am on duty I must wear it. You know enough of discipline to understand that I must."

"Yes. But women don't need discipline, God bless 'em." His old eyes twinkled. "Has Derry come in?"

"Yes, and gone to bed. He asked after you."

"And it's Thanksgiving morning?"

"Yes."

"And no turkey for me. But you'll get me a glass of wine?"

"I'm not sure. I'll ask the Doctor."

She sat beside him until he again dozed. Then made her way once more to the room where the lovely gowns were piled high on the bed, and the jewels sparkled on the dressing-table. Quickly and noiselessly she put them in place. Then she tried to take off the collar, but the snaps held. She tugged and pressed, but with no result. She was afraid to pull too hard lest she break the snaps.

At last she was forced to button the collar of her linen gown above it. She smoothed her hair and put on her cap. The room as she surveyed it showed no sign of her occupation. She put out the light and returned to her patient.

She was at the front door to let the Doctor in when he arrived.

"The General is awake, and wants to see you. I'll come down when you go, and we can talk."

As they entered the shadowed room together, the old man opened his eyes. "Hello, McKenzie. Nurse, what made you put on your cap? I don't like it."

"I shouldn't dare leave it off when the Doctor's here."

"Does she have to take your orders or mine, McKenzie?"

"Mine," smiling; "that's one of the perquisites of my profession, to have all the nurses under my thumb."

"Don't you try to please your patients?"

"Yes."

"Then tell her to leave off her cap."

He began to cough. The Doctor bent over him. Hilda helped to make the old man comfortable.

When at last the General drifted into slumber, the two went down together. The hall clock pointed to four.

They stood at the foot of the great stairway. From the landing the painted lady smiled at them.

"Hilda, I am going to France."

She expressed no surprise. "When did you make up your mind?"

"In a sense it is not made up. I think I am waiting for you to confirm my decision. They want me at the head of a hospital staff, to deal with cases of shock. I should like to have you in charge of my nurses."

She meditated. "I am not sure that I care to go."

He showed his surprise. "I understood that if I went, you would go—"

"I don't think I said that."

"Perhaps not. But it didn't occur to me that you would back out." His voice showed the irritation of a man balked in the thing he wants.

"I haven't backed out. I don't know what I want to do. I have to think it over."

He ran his fingers through his hair. "What made you change your mind?"

"I like to be comfortable. And it isn't comfortable over there."

"For Heaven's sake, Hilda—don't make yourself out as selfish as that."

"I am not any more selfish than other people, but I am honest. I don't go around deceiving myself with the idea that if I go I shall be doing something wonderful. But you—that's why you are going—to be wonderful in your own eyes, and Jean's eyes and in the eyes of the world."

"I don't think it is that," he said soberly. "I hope not. I have tried to see straight. I sometimes think it is you who are seeing crooked, Hilda."

They faced each other squarely. Her chin was slightly lifted. He caught the gleam of jewels at her throat.

"Hilda," he said, sharply, "where did you get those diamonds?"

Her hand flew up to them. She was not in the least disconcerted. "I might as well tell you. They belonged to the General's wife. I didn't have anything to do tonight, so I've been trying them on. There isn't any harm in that, is there?"

"It's rather dangerous," slowly; "why didn't you take the collar off?"

"The snap caught just as you came, and I couldn't unfasten it."

"Did the General know that you tried them on?"

"Of course not. He was asleep."

"Bend your head down, and let me look at the snap."

She leaned towards him, bringing her neck against his hand. The little curls of bright hair sprang up towards his fingers as he worked at the obstinate catch. But he did his work steadily, and as she straightened up again, he dropped the collar into her hand.

"If you will take my advice," he said, "you won't do a thing like that again. People might not understand."

"You mean that they might think I had stolen it? I am not a thief, Doctor—"

"Of course not. Do you think you have to tell me that? And are we quarrelling, Hilda?"

She swung back to her normal calm. "I am tired and cross—"

"I know you are tired. I hope the day nurse will relieve you. I can get two nurses, and let you off entirely."

She shook her head. "I'll stay here. I am interested in the case. And I want to see it through. By the way, he has asked again for wine."

"He can't have it, I told you. You must say that my orders are strict."

He held out his hand. "Then you won't go to France with me?"

"Let me sleep on it,"—her fingers were firm on his own—"and don't scold me any more."

"Did I scold?"

"Yes."

"I am sorry."

She smiled at him. The slow smile which transformed her. "I'll forgive you. Call me up in the morning, please."

She let him out, and went silently up the stairs. The General was again awake. "I want to talk," he told her; "take off your cap, and sit where I can look at you."

He was still feverish, still not quite responsible for what he might say.

She sat with the light falling full upon her. She never made an unnecessary movement, and her stillness soothed him. She was a good listener, and he grew garrulous.

At last he spoke of his wife. "Sometimes I think she is here and I find myself speaking. A little while ago, I thought I heard her moving in her room, but when I opened my eyes you were bending over me. Sometimes I seem to hear her singing—there is never a moment that I do not miss her. If I were good enough I might hope to meet her—perhaps the Lord will let the strength of my love compensate for the weakness of my will."

So on and on in the broken old voice.

Bronson came at six, and Hilda went away to have some sleep. While the General drowsed she had put the collar safely away behind the Chinese scroll.

As she passed through the hall, she stopped for a moment at the head of the stairs. The painted lady smiled at her, the painted lady who was loved by the old man in the shadowed room.

No, Hilda was not a thief. Yet as she stood there, in the cold dawn of that Thanksgiving morning, she had it in her mind to steal from the painted lady things more precious than a pearl collar or an ermine cloak or the diamonds in a crown!



CHAPTER XII

WHEN THE MORNING STARS SANG

Jean was having her breakfast in bed. Emily had slipped downstairs to drink an early cup of coffee with the Doctor and to warn him, "Don't tell her to-day."

"Why not?"

"It will spoil her feast. Derry Drake is coming to dinner."

"The robber—"

"Do you really feel that way about it?"

"I don't know how I feel."

He rose and went to the window. "It's a rotten morning."

"It is Thanksgiving."

"I haven't much to be thankful for," moodily. "I am, you tell me, about to lose my daughter. I am, also, it would seem, to part company with my best nurse."

"Hilda?"

"Yes. I wanted her to take charge of things for me in France. She elects to stay here."

"But why?"

"She's a—woman."

"You don't mean that. And I must say that I am rather glad that she is not going."

It was out at last! She had a feeling as if she had taken a cold plunge and had survived it!

"Glad? What do you mean, Emily?"

"Every time I waked in the night, I thought of Jean and of how she would feel if Hilda went with you. Do you realize that if she goes, there are things that the world will say?"

His face was stern. "You are very brave to tell me that, Emily."

"It had to be said, and last night I shirked it."

"But Hilda is a very good nurse."

"Do you think of her only as a—good nurse?"

He turned that over in his mind. "No. In a sense she's rather attractive. She satisfies a certain side of me—."

"The best side?"

He avoided an answer to that. "When she is away I miss her."

And now Miss Emily, shaking a little, but not showing it, made him face the situation squarely.

"Have you ever thought that, missing her, you might want to marry her?"

"I have thought of it. Why not, Emily?"

"Have you thought that it would make her your Jean's—mother—?"

His startled look met her steadfast one. His mind flew back to Hilda as she had bent down to him the night before, that he might unfasten the necklace. He thought of the evil that her eyes saw in him, and in the rest of the world. He thought of Jean, and of her white young dreams.

"No," he said, as if to himself, "not that—"

She laid her hand on his arm, "Go by yourself—there's a big work over there, and you can do it best—alone."

He looked down at her, smiling a little, but smiling sadly. "If Jean's mother had lived I should not have been such a weathercock. Will you write to me—promise me that you will write."

"Of course," cheerfully. "Oh, by the way, Julia tells me that dinner will be at three, and that two soldier boys are coming. I rather think I shall like that."

He ran his fingers through his crinkled hair. "What a lot you get out of life, Emily."

"What makes you say that?"

"Little things count so much with you. You are like Jean. She is in seventh Heaven over a snowstorm—or a chocolate soda. It's the youth in her—and it's the youth, too, in you—"

She liked that, and flushed a little. "Perhaps it is because there have been so few big things, Bruce, that the little ones look big."

He had a fleeting sense of what Emily would be like with some big thing in her life—how far would it swing her from her sedate course?

"You have done me a lot of good," he said heartily when she left him to go upstairs to Jean.

Jean was still in bed. "I must run down to the shop," Emily informed her. "But I'll be back in plenty of time to dress for dinner."

"Darling—" Jean reminded her, "you must go to church."

"Of course. I shall stop on my way down."

"Pray for me, Emily." She reached out her arms. Emily came to them and they clung together. "I am so happy, darling—" Jean whispered, "but there isn't anything to tell, not really—yet—Emily—"

When Emily had gone, Jean got out her memory books. She had made of breakfast a slight affair. How could one eat in the face of such astounding events. Already this morning flowers had arrived for her, heather and American Beauties. And Derry had written on his card, "The heather because of you—the roses because of the day—"

There were two hours on her hands before church. She could dress in one—the intervening time must be filled.

Her memory books were great fat volumes kept on a shelf by themselves, and forming a record of everything that had happened to her since her first day at boarding school. They were in no sense diaries, nor could they be called scrap-books. They had, rather, been compiled with an eye to certain red-letter events—and their bulkiness had been enhanced by the insertion between the leaves of various objects not intended for such limited space. There was a mask which she had worn at Hallowe'en; the tulle which had tied her roses at graduation; a little silver ring marking a childish romance; a flattened and much-dried chocolate drop with tender associations; dance-favors, clippings, photographs, theater programs, each illumined and emphasized by a line or two of sentiment or of nonsense in Jean's girlish scrawl.

Even now, as she turned the leaves, she found herself laughing over a rhyme which her father had cut from his daily paper, and had sent in response to her wild plea for a box of something good to eat:

"Mary had a little lamb, A little pork, a little jam, A little egg on toast, A little potted roast, A little stew with dumplings white, A little shad, For Mary had, A little appetite."

The big box had followed—how dear Daddy had always been—but had she ever wanted to eat like that?

There were letters which her father had written, pasted in, envelopes and all, to be read in certain longing moments when she had missed him and her mother. There were love letters from certain callow college boys—love—! She laughed now as she thought of the pale passion they had offered her.

Derry had had no word for her the night before when he had left her at her door. Her father had been with her, so Derry could only press her hand and watch her as she went in. But there had been no need for words. All the evening what they had felt had flamed between them—.

So with the desire to preserve a record of these marvellous moments which were crowding into her life, she chose a perfectly new book to be devoted to Derry. And on the first page she pasted, not the faded violet from the basket which had come to her yesterday—oh, day of days!—not the dance program on which Derry's name was most magically scrawled, nor the spring of heather, nor a handful of rose leaves from the offering of the morning—no, the very first thing that went into Jean's memory book was a frayed silken tassel that had been cut from a rose-colored curtain! She had carried down her little scissors the night before, and had snipped it, and here it was—an omen for her own rose-colored future!

Starry-eyed she lay back among her pillows.

"Oh, Polly-Ann, Polly-Ann," she said tensely, to the small cat on the cushions, "if I should ever wake up and find that it wasn't true—"

Polly-Ann stared at her with mystical green orbs. She could offer no help, but she served as a peg upon which Jean could hang her eloquence. She stretched herself luxuriously and purred.

"But it is true, Polly-Ann," Jean said, "and I am going to church with him—wasn't it beautiful that he should think of going to church with me on Thanksgiving morning, Polly-Ann?"

She dressed herself presently, making a sort of sacred rite of it—because of Derry. She was glad that she was pretty—because of Derry. Glad that her gray fur coat was becoming—glad of the red rose against it.

He came in his car, but they decided to walk.

"I always walk to church," said Jean.

"There's sleet falling," said Derry.

"I don't care," said Jean.

"Nor I," said Derry.

And so they started out together!

It was a dismal day, but they did not know it. They knelt together in the old church. They prayed together. And when at last the benediction had been said and they stood together for a moment alone in the pew, Derry looked down at her and said, "Beloved," and the morning stars sang—!

When they went out, the sleet was coming thick and fast, and Derry's car was waiting. And when they were safe inside, he turned to her and his voice exulted, "I haven't even told you that I love you—I haven't asked you to marry me—I haven't done any of the conventional things—it hasn't needed words, and that's the wonder of it."

"Yes."

"But you knew."

"Yes."

"From the first?"

"I think it was from the first—"

"In the Toy Shop?"

"Yes."

"And you thought I was poor—and I thought you were just the girl in the shop?"

"Isn't it wonderful?"

It was more wonderful than they knew.

"Do you know that my money has always been more important to some people than I have been? I have thought they cared for me because of it."

"Ralph said last night that I cared—for the money."

She would not tell him of the other things that Ralph had said. And even as she thought of him, across the path of her rapture fell the shadow of Ralph's scorn of Derry.

He bent down to her. "Jean, if I had been that shabby boy that you first saw in the shop would you have been happy with me, in a plain little house? Would you?"

Up the streets came the people from the churches—the crowds of people who had thanked the Lord soberly, feeling meantime a bit bewildered as to the workings of His Providence. Most of them were going home to somewhat modified feasts. Many of them were having a soldier or two to dine with them. And presently these soldiers whom they feasted would be crossing the sea to that dread land of death and desolation.

Should they thank the Lord for that?

Some of the clergymen, craving light, had sought it in the Old Testament. But one, more inspired than the rest, had found it in the New.

"And there was war in Heaven; Michael and his angels fought against the dragon; and the dragon fought and his angels. And prevailed not—neither was their place found any more in Heaven."

Those who came from that church spoke of a Holy War, and were thankful that there were men in America going forth to fight the Dragon.

The two soldiers who were to dine at Dr. McKenzie's were plain young fellows from an upper county in Maryland. They were waiting somewhat awkwardly in the drawing-room when Jean arrived. She took them at once to the less formal library, left Derry with them and went upstairs to dress.

As she came into the fresh and frilly room so identified with her child life and her girl life, she stopped on the threshold.

Oh, little room, little room, the child that once lived here will never come again!

She knelt beside the bed, her face buried in her hands. No words came, but in her heart she was saying, "My beloved is mine—and I am his—"

When she went down, Dr. McKenzie was there, and Emily, and the two young soldiers had lost their awkwardness. When they found out afterwards that the young Drake who talked to them so simply and unaffectedly was DeRhymer Drake, the multi-millionaire, they refused to believe it. "He was a mighty nice chap. He didn't put on a bit of side, and the dinner was some feast."

And how could they know that Derry was envying them their cavalry yellow and their olive drab?

As for Jean, throughout the afternoon they gazed upon her as upon an enchanting vision. When they told her "Good-bye" it was the boldest who asked, with a flush on his hard cheek, if he might have a bit of the heather which she wore. "I am Scotch myself, and my mother was, and it would seem a sort of mascot."

If she hesitated for a moment it was only Derry who noticed it. And he helped her out. "It will be a proud day for the heather."

So she gave away a part of his gift, and thanked him with her eyes.

It was after the boys had gone that Derry had a talk alone with Dr. McKenzie.

"But you haven't known her a month—"

"I have wanted her all my life."

"I see—how old are you?"

"Thirty-one."

"You don't look it."

"No. And I don't feel it. Not to-day."

"And you think that she cares?"

"What do you think, sir?"

The Doctor threw up his hands. "Oh, lad, lad, there's all the wonder of it in her eyes when she looks at you."

When Derry went at last to find Jean, she was not in the library. He crossed the hall to the little drawing-room. His love sat by the fire alone.

"My darling—"

Thus she came to his arms. But even then he held her gently, worshipping her innocence and respecting it.

The next morning he brought her a ring. It was such a wonderful ring that she held her breath. She sat on the rose-colored davenport while he put it on her finger.

"If I had been the girl in the Toy Shop," she told him, "and you had been the shabby boy, you would have given me a gold band with three little stones—and I should have liked that, too."

"You shall have the gold ring some day, and it won't have stones in it—and it will be a wedding ring."

"Oh—"

"And when yon wear it I shall call you—Friend Wife—"



CHAPTER XIII

ARE MEN MADE ONLY FOR THIS?

In the afternoon the lovers made a triumphant pilgrimage to the place where they had first met. All the toys in the little shop stared at them—the clowns and the dancers in pink and yellow and the bisque babies and the glassy-eyed dogs and cats.

The white elephant was again in the window. "He seemed so lonely," Emily explained, "and with Christmas coming I couldn't feel comfortable to think of him away from it all."

Jean showed Derry her midnight camels. "I am going to do peacocks next," she told him. "I am so proud."

He bought all of the camels and a lot of other things. "We'll take them to Margaret Morgan's kiddies tomorrow; I want you to meet her."

Miss Emily found her lavish customer interesting, but demoralizing. "Run away with him, Jean," she said. "I am not used to Croesuses. He won't leave anything to sell, and then what shall I say to the people who want to buy?"

"Shut up your shop and go to tea with us at Chevy Chase," Derry suggested.

Emily smiled at him. "It is good of you to ask me, but I can't. I am not in love, and I have my day's work to do. But I think if you would like to take Jean—"

"Alone?" eagerly. "Do you think I might?"

"Why not?"

"I was almost afraid to suggest it."

"I am not a dragon. And there will never be a day like this for you again."

Jean broke in at that. "Oh, Emily, they will be wonderfuller!"

"But not this day—"

Derry knew what she meant. "How sweet you are."

Miss Emily, flushing, was a transformed Miss Emily. "Well, old people are apt to forget, and I have not forgotten."

"Darling, darling," Jean chanted. "I am going to paint dragons, and they shall all have lovely faces, and I shall call them the Not-Forgetting Dragons."

It was all very superlative. Miss Emily tried to send them away, but they still lingered. Jean set the music boxes going to celebrate the occasion, then stopped them because the only tunes they played were German tunes.

Derry laughed at her, then came to silence before a box of tin soldiers. They were little French soldiers, flat on their backs, bright with paint—

"I wonder how they feel about it?" he asked Jean.

"About what?"

"Shut up in a box, doing nothing—"

As the lovers drove away, Emily stood at the window looking after them. There was one customer in the shop, but Miss Emily had a feeling that he would keep himself amused until she was ready to wait on him. She had intuitions about the people who came to buy, and this tall spare man with the slight droop of his shoulders, his upstanding bush of gray hair, his shell glasses on a black ribbon was, she was aware, having the time of his life. No little boy could have spent more time over the toys. He fingered them lovingly as he peered through his big horn glasses.

He saw Miss Emily looking at him and smiling. "It was the white elephant that brought me in. He was made in Germany?"

"Yes."

"It is not easy to get them any more?"

"No. You see I have a little card on him 'Not for sale.'"

He nodded. "I should like to buy him—"

She shook her head. "I have refused many offers."

"I can understand that. Yet, perhaps if I should tell you?"

There was a slight trace of foreign accent in his speech. She stiffened. She felt that he was capable of calling her "Fraeulein." There was not the least doubt in her mind as to the Teutonic extraction of this gentleman who was shamelessly trying to induce her to sell her elephant.

"I can't imagine any reason that would make me change my mind."

"My father is German; he makes toys."

She showed her surprise. "Makes toys?"

"Yes. He is an old man—eighty-five. He was born in Nuremberg. Until he was twenty-five he made elephants like the one in your window. Now do you see?"

She was not sure that she did see. "Well?"

"I want him for my father's Christmas present."

"Impossible," coldly; "he is not for sale."

He was still patient. "He will make you another—many others."

He had her attention now. "Make—elephants?"

"Yes. He needs only a pattern. There are certain things he has forgotten. I should like to make him happy."

Miss Emily, hostilely convinced that it was not her business to contribute to the happiness of any octogenarian Hun, shook her head, "I'm sorry."

"Then you won't sell him?"

"Certainly not."

He still lingered. "You love your toys—I have been here before, and I have watched you. They are not just sawdust and wood and cloth and paint to you—they are real—"

"Yes."

"My father is like that. They are real to him. There's an old wax doll that was my mother's. He loves her and talks to her—. Because she was made in that Germany which is dead—"

The fierceness in his voice, the flash of his eye; the thrust of his hand as if it held a rapier!

"Dead?"

"The Germany he knew died when Prussia throttled her. Her poetry died, her music—there is no echo now from the Rhine but that of—guns."

"You feel—that way—?"

"Yes."

"Then sit down and tell me—tell me—" She was eager.

"Tell you what?"

"About your father, about the toys, about the Germany that is—dead."

He was glad to tell her. It poured forth, with now and then an offending phrase, "Gott in Himmel, do they think we have forgotten? My father came to America because he loved freedom—he fought in the Civil War for freedom—he loves freedom still; and over there they are fighting for slavery. The slavery of the little nations, the slavery of those who love democracy. They want Prussia, and more Prussia, and more Prussia—" He struck his hand on the counter so that all the dolls danced.