"You are interested in Plooie?" I asked.
"Plooie?" he repeated doubtfully. I explained to him and he laughed gently. "Profoundly interested," he said. "I have here one of his finest umbrellas which his good wife presented to me. There was also a lady of whom he speaks, a _grande dame_, of very great authority." For all the sadness of the deep voice, I felt that his eyes were twinkling.
"Madame Tallafferr," supplied the Bonnie La.s.sie. "She is away on a visit."
"I should like to have met that queller of mobs. She ought to be knighted."
"Knighthood would add nothing to her status," said I, dryly. "She is a Pinckney and a Pemberton besides being a Tallafferr, with two _f_s, two _l_s, and two _r_s."
"Doubtless. I do not comprehend the details of your American orders of merit," said the big sad-voiced man courteously. "But I should have been proud to meet her."
"May I tell her that?" asked the Bonnie La.s.sie eagerly.
"By all means--when I am gone." Again I felt the smile that must be in the eyes. "But there were others here, not so friendly to the little Garin. That is true, is it not?"
"Yes," said the Bonnie La.s.sie.
"There is at least a strong suspicion that he is not a deserving case,"
I pointed out defensively.
"Then it is only because he does not explain himself well," returned the Belgian quickly.
"He does not explain himself at all," I corrected. "Nor does Annie Oom--his wife."
"Ah? That will clarify itself, perhaps, in time. If you will bear with me, I should like to tell you a little story to be pa.s.sed on to those who are not his friends. Will you not be seated, Madame?"
The Bonnie La.s.sie resumed her place on the bench. Standing before us, the big man began to speak. Many times since have I wished that I might have taken down what he said verbatim; so gracious it was, so simple, so straightly the expression of a great and generous personality.
"Emile Garin," he said, "was a son of Belgium. He was poor and his people were little folk of nothing-at-all. Moreover, they were dead. So he came to your great country to make his living. When our enemies invaded my country and the call went out to all sons of Belgium, the little Garin was ashamed because he knew that he was physically unfit for military service. But he tried. He tried everywhere. In the mornings they must sweep him away from our Consul-General"s doorsteps here because otherwise he would not--You spoke, Monsieur?"
"Nothing. I only said, "G.o.d forgive us!""
"Amen," said the narrator gravely. "Everywhere they rejected him as unfit. So he became morbid. He hid himself away. Is it not so?"
"That is why they left Our Square so mysteriously," confirmed the Bonnie La.s.sie.
"After that he hung about the docks. He saw his chance and crawled into the hold of a vessel as a stowaway. He starved. It did not matter. He was kicked. It did not matter. He was arrested. It did not matter.
Nothing mattered except that he should reach Belgium. And he did reach my country at the darkest hour, the time when Belgium needed every man, no matter who he was. But he could not be a soldier, the little Garin, because he was unable to march. He had weak legs."
At this point the eternal feminine a.s.serted itself in the Bonnie La.s.sie.
"I _told_ you there was something," she murmured triumphantly.
"Hush!" said I.
"I am glad to find that he had one true defender here," pursued the biographer of Plooie. "Though he could not fight in the ranks there was use for him. There was use for all true sons of Belgium in those black days. He was made driver of a--a charette; I do not know if you have them in your great city?" He paused, and I guessed that the rumble of heavy wheels on the asphalt, heard near by, had come opportunely. "Ah, yes; there is one."
"A dump-cart," supplied the Bonnie La.s.sie.
"Merci, Madame. A dump-cart. It is perhaps not an evidently glorious thing to drive a dump-cart for one"s country--unless one makes it so.
But it was the best the little Garin could do. His legs were what you call quaint--I have already told you. He was faithful and hard-working.
They helped build roads near the front, the little Garin and his big cart."
"Not precisely safety-first," whispered the Bonnie La.s.sie to me, maliciously.
"You are interrupting the story," said I with dignity.
"One day he was driving a load of mud through a village street. Here on this side is a hospital. There on that side is another hospital. Down the middle of the road walks an idiot of a sergeant carrying a new type of grenade with which we were experimenting. One moves a little lever--so. One counts; one, two, three, four, five. One throws the grenade, and at the count of ten, all about it is destroyed, for it is of terrible power. The idiot sergeant sets down the grenade in the middle of the road between the two hospitals full of the helplessly wounded. For what? Perhaps to sneeze. Perhaps to light a cigarette.
Heaven only knows, for the sergeant has the luck to be killed next day by a German sh.e.l.l, before he can be court-martialed. As he sets down the grenade, the little lever is moved. The sergeant loses his head. He runs, shouting to everybody to run also.
"But the hospitals, they cannot run. And the wounded, they cannot run.
They can only be still and wait. In the nearest hospital there is a visitor. A great lady. A great and greatly loved lady." The sad voice deepened and softened.
"I know," whispered the Bonnie La.s.sie; "I can guess."
"Yes. But the little Garin, approaching on his big dump-cart, does not know. He knows the danger, for he hears the shouts and sees the people escaping. He sees the grenade, too. A man running past him shouts, "Turn your cart, you fool, and save yourself." Oh, yes; he can save himself.
That is easy. But what of the people in the hospitals? Who can save them? The little Garin thinks hard and swiftly. He drives his big dump-cart over the grenade. He pulls the lever which dumps the mud. The mud buries the grenade; much mud, very soft and heavy. The grenade explodes, nevertheless.
"One mule blows through one hospital, one through another. Everything near is covered with mud. The great lady is thrown to the floor, but she is not hurt. She rises and attends the injured and calms the terrified.
The hospitals are saved. It is a glorious thing to have driven a dump-cart for one"s country--so."
"But what became of our Plooie?" besought the Bonnie La.s.sie.
The big man spread his arms in a wide, Gallic gesture. "They looked for him everywhere. No sign. But by and by some one saw a quite large piece of mud on the hospital roof begin to wriggle. The little Garin was that large piece of mud. They brought him down and put him in the hospital which he had saved. For a long time he had sh.e.l.l-shock. Even now he cannot speak of the war without his nerves being affected. When he got out of hospital, he did not seem to know who he was. Or perhaps he did not care. Sh.e.l.l-shock is a strange thing. He went away, and his records were lost in the general confusion. Afterward we sought for him. The great lady wished very much to see him. But we could find nothing except that he had come back to this country. Official inquiry was made here and he was traced to Our Square. So I came to see him. Because he cannot speak for himself and will not allow his wife to tell his story--it is part of the sh.e.l.l-shock which will wear off in time--I came to speak for him."
"Does your--do you do this sort of thing often?" asked the Bonnie La.s.sie with a queer sort of resonance in her voice.
The big man answered, in a tone which suggested that he was smiling: "One cannot visit all the brave men who suffered for Belgium. But there is a special reason here, the matter of the great and greatly loved lady whom the little Garin saved."
"I see," said the Bonnie La.s.sie softly.
After the big man had made his adieux, we sat silent for some minutes.
Presently she spoke; there was wonder and something else in her voice.
"Plooie!" she said, and that was all.
"You are crying," I said.
"I"m not," she retorted indignantly. "But you ought to be. For your injustice."
"If we all bewept our injustices," said I oracularly, "Noah would have to come back and build a new ark for a bigger flood than his."
"What do you think of him?" said the Bonnie La.s.sie.
"As a weather-prophet, he was unequaled. As an expert animal-breeder, his selections were at times ill-advised."
"Don"t be tiresome, Dominie. You know that I"m not interested in Noah."
"As to our romantic visitant," I said, "I think that Cyrus the Gaunt would better be watchful. I"ve never known anyone else except Cyrus to produce such an emotional effect upon you."