"I am sorry, Miss Patricia," she said, "but remember that I am not a child and cannot have you speak to me as if I were a disobedient one. I have been for a walk and----"
But fortunately Sally was not required to complete her sentence.
Suddenly Mrs. Burton had appeared out of her bedroom and began to hurry downstairs.
"Sally!" she called with a suggestion of appeal in her voice. "The excitement over your disappearance is my fault, so please don"t you and Aunt Patricia quarrel. A little while ago when I returned home and Mere "Toinette told me that you had gone out alone and she did not know in what direction, why, I became uneasy. You will not again, will you?
Really I am afraid it is not safe for you children, although with me of course the case is different. Aunt Patricia is not disposed to think so, forgetting my advanced age. Still, Sally, no matter how enthusiastic we may feel over our work here in the sh.e.l.l-torn area of France, we must remember these are war times when one never knows what may happen next.
Besides, the French do not always understand our American ideas of liberty for young girls."
By this time having reached the foot of the stairs, Mrs. Burton slipped her hand inside Sally"s, glancing back with a slightly amused and slightly apologetic expression toward Miss Patricia.
"Really, Aunt Patricia, I do regret your being so annoyed, yet you must not take my news too seriously. Our guests are sure not to remain with us long."
To the latter part of her Camp Fire guardian"s remark Sally Ashton paid not the slightest heed, so concerned was she with the first part of her speech.
Why of all times should this question of her personal liberty come up for discussion _this_ afternoon? Of her own free choice Sally felt convinced that she would never willingly go out alone. Nevertheless, how was she to keep her word to the young soldier unless she returned next day to the chateau? with the food she had promised him and without confiding the fact to any one else? Oh, why had she allowed herself to be drawn into this reckless promise? At this moment if she could only slip into her Camp Fire guardian"s room and ask her advice! Miss Patricia would insist that if the soldier were a deserter he straightway should be brought to justice. But Sally understood her Camp Fire guardian well enough to appreciate that, once hearing the soldier in hiding was ill and wounded, she would be as reluctant as Sally herself to follow her manifest duty.
Confidence on this particular subject was for the present out of the question, and as soon as she conveniently could Sally disappeared inside her own room. Later, when the other girls had returned, weary from their long errand of mercy in the next village and yet immensely interested in their experience, Sally pretended to have a slight headache.
During supper she scarcely listened to the ever steady stream of conversation which flowed unceasingly each evening. In the daytime the American newcomers to the old French farm on the Aisne were too much engaged to allow opportunity for conversation. After supper they gathered in their improvised sitting-room to talk until their early bedtime.
The sitting-room was oddly furnished with whatever furniture could be rescued after the commandeering of the more valuable possessions by the Germans.
In the attic a few broken chairs stored away for years had been brought down and repaired. These were beautiful pieces of furniture in conspicuous contrast to the couches and stools which originally had arrived at the farm as large wooden boxes containing provisions.
With old Jean"s a.s.sistance, Peggy and Vera had developed unexpected talents as carpenters.
Moreover, whatever her faults, Miss Patricia Lord was an unfailing source of supply. During her brief stay in Paris, without mentioning the fact to any one else, she had purchased thirty yards of old blue and rose cretonne, perhaps with the knowledge that beauty even of the simplest kind helps one to happiness and accomplishment.
Therefore the two couches in the sitting-room were covered with the cretonne, and half a dozen box chairs; and there were cretonne valances at the windows.
Save a single old lamp which had been left in the sitting-room, it had no other ornaments.
The lamp was of bronze and bore the figure of a genie holding the stand, so that obviously it had been christened "Aladdin"s lamp." It was supposed to gratify whatever wish one expressed, but the Camp Fire girls were too busy with the interests of other people at present to spend much time in considering their personal desires.
There was one other object of interest in the room, a large photograph of the ruined Rheims Cathedral, which Mrs. Burton had bought in the neighborhood of Rheims not long before. The cla.s.sic French city was not many miles from the present home of the group of American girls.
As beautiful almost in destruction as it had been in its former glory, the photograph stood as a symbol of the imperishable beauty of French art. Also it represented another symbol. Here on the white wooden mantel of the French farm house "on the field of honor" it called to the American people to continue their work for the relief and the restoration of France.
Tonight as she lay resting upon one of the couches, dressed in a simple dinner dress of some soft violet material, Mrs. Burton had glanced several times toward the photograph.
As a tribute to her headache and a general disinclination to a.s.sociate with her companions, Sally had been permitted to occupy the other couch which stood on the opposite side of the room.
In their one large chair, close to the table with the lamp, Aunt Patricia sat knitting with her usual vigor and determination. Aside from Sally, the Camp Fire girls were grouped about near her.
After having been quiet for the past half hour, Mrs. Burton suddenly asked: "Would any of you care to hear a poem concerning the destruction of the Cathedral at Rheims, written by a Kentucky woman? A friend sent it to me and it was so exquisite I have lately memorized it. In the last few moments while I have been looking at our photograph I have repeated the lines to myself. I wonder if it would interest you?"
The girls replied in a chorus of acquiescence, but Mrs. Burton did not venture to begin until she also had received a nod of agreement from Aunt Patricia. Between the older and younger woman there was a bond of strong affection. Nevertheless, mingled with Mrs. Burton"s love and respect, there was also a certain humorous appreciation.
Since their arrival in France the Camp Fire girls had been compelled to spend their evenings in doors. This was unlike their former custom.
Recently, when they had grown weary of talking, perhaps for only a half hour before bedtime, some one of them had fallen into the habit of reading aloud to the others.
Apart from the pleasure, Mrs. Burton regarded this as useful education.
Not a great many newspapers and magazines reached the old farm house in comparison with other days at camp; nevertheless they arrived in sufficient number both from the United States and Paris to keep one fairly in touch with world movements. The reading of the French papers and magazines was of course especially good practice.
Yet, as a matter of fact, Mrs. Burton could seldom be persuaded to be anything save a listener. After reading or talking the greater part of the day to her new French friends, she was apt to be worn out by evening.
Tonight she began to speak in a low voice as if she were tired, yet as her little audience was so near it did not matter and her voice never failed in its beautiful quality.
"Rheims
"It was a people"s church--stout, plain folk they, Wanting their own cathedral, not the king"s Nor prelate"s, nor great n.o.ble"s. On the walls, On porch and arch and doorway--see, the saints Have the plain people"s faces. That sweet Virgin Was young Marie, who lived around the corner, And whom the sculptor knew. From time to time He saw her at her work, or with her babe, So gay, so dainty, smiling at the child.
That st.u.r.dy Peter--Peter of the keys-- He was old Jean, the Breton fisherman, Who, somehow, made his way here from the coast And lived here many years, yet kept withal The look of the great sea and his great nets.
And John there, the beloved, was Etienne, And good St. James was Francois--brothers they, And had a small, clean bakeshop, where they sold Bread, cakes and little pies. Well, so it went!
These were not Italy"s saints, nor yet the G.o.ds, Majestic, calm, unmoved, of ancient Greece.
No, they were only townsfolk, common people, And graced a common church--that stood and stood Through war and fire and pestilence, through ravage Of time and kings and conquerors, till at last The century dawned which promised common men The things they long had hoped for!
O the time Showed a fair face, was daughter of great Demos, Flamboyant, bore a light, laughed loud and free, And feared not any man--until--until-- There sprang a mailed figure from a throne, Gorgeous, imperial, glowing--a monstrosity Magnificent as death and as death terrible.
It walked these aisles and saw the humble ones, Peter the fisherman, James and John, the shopkeepers, And Mary, sweet, gay, innocent and poor.
Loud did it laugh and long. "These peaceful folk!
What place have they in my great armed world?"
Then with its thunderbolts of fire it drove These saints from out their places--breaking roof, Wall, window, portal--and the great grave arch Smoked with the awful funeral smoke of doom.
"Thus died they and their church--but from the wreck Of fire and smoke and broken wood and stone There rose a figure greater far than they-- Their Lord, who dwells within no house of hands; Whose beauty hath no need of any form!
Out from the fire He pa.s.sed, and round Him went Marie and Jean and Etienne and Francois, And they went singing, singing, through their France-- And Italy--and England--and the world!"
When Mrs. Burton began her recitation she sat up on the edge of her couch and leaning forward kept her eyes fastened sometimes on the floor, sometimes on the picture of the great cathedral. Now and then her gaze quickly swept the faces of her audience.
She was wondering if the poem had bored any one of them. It was a long poem and perhaps its spiritual meaning would not be altogether plain.
However, as the poem reached its conclusion, and her voice with its dramatic power and sweetness made the picture of the peasant people and their peasant church a visible and compelling thing, she no longer felt fearful.
The faces of the girls before her were fine and serious; Bettina and Marta, who cared more for poetry and art than the others, had flushed and their eyes were filled with tears.
As Mrs. Burton finished, it was as if one could actually hear the new spirit of brotherhood which Christ preached two thousand years ago, "singing, singing, through the world."
Yet in the silence which was a fitting tribute to the poem, suddenly the entire audience broke into a ripple of laughter. From the far side of the room a gentle snore had been Sally Ashton"s sole expression of appreciation.
Following the sound of the laughter, Sally sat up and began blinking her soft golden brown eyes, looking for all the world like a sleepy kitten.
"I think you had far better give yourself up to justice and have someone take care of you properly," she announced in a far-away voice. This was the conclusion which Sally had just reached at the end of her half-sleeping and half-waking dream of her runaway soldier.
She did not know that she was to make such an extraordinary remark aloud, but fortunately no one had the faintest knowledge of her meaning.
Indeed, no one really heard her, as the girls were too amused over Sally"s characteristic habit of falling asleep on occasions when conversation or entertainment bored her.
Immediately after the laughter, Sally, not understanding its cause, nevertheless arose and began her journey to bed. She was annoyed but not seriously, since in waking she had reached the conclusion she desired.
In the morning at dawn, before the other members of her household were awake, she would make a second trip to the chateau.