"You will get word when and where to report," said the General. "And jolly fine of you, I must say!"
The thing was done; no turning back, now. The next step was to send a cable announcing his decision to his employer, who replied:
"Go ahead. We"ll keep your job for you!"
CHAPTER XXIV
HELEN ARRIVES
Phil enclosed his father"s cablegram in a letter to the vicar of Truckleford, which was answered by a telegram reminding him that he was expected "home" very soon. With only thirty-six hours which he could call his own before he reported for duty, he set out by the early afternoon train. He had bought all the textbooks of gunnery that he could find in the shops, and had sat up cramming the previous night.
Four of them were in his bag and one was under his arm, along with some magazines that he had bought at the stall, as he followed the porter down the platform of the station.
His recollection of all that had happened since he had taken that same train two months ago was startled by one of the a.s.sociations of the first journey in the life entering a compartment just ahead of him.
Helen Ribot, too, was going to Truckleford. He wondered how he should interpret her start, with its long-drawn "Oh!" at sight of him; but she hastened to make her own interpretation when she had recovered from her surprise.
"It"s the first time I"ve been down," she said, "and I"m going only for a day, as I"m very busy and living regularly in London, now."
There was a cheery tone of independence in the closing statement, for statement it was. In the midst of war Miss Helen Ribot had made her own start in the world. Then some commonplaces. Yes, her mother was still at Truckleford and Henriette with her. Both were well. Had he heard from home? Yes, it looked as if the Germans had made a decided stand on the Aisne.
"I see that you are prepared to read. So am I," she concluded pleasantly, as she took a book out of her bag.
Puzzled by this new Helen, so poised and affable but somehow uncousinly, there was nothing to do but follow her suggestion. As he turned the leaves of one of the big ill.u.s.trated weeklies he noted something so distinctively familiar with the first glance at the double page, that he would have recognised a single figure of the drawing of the Germans in retreat from the Marne, without having the confirmation of Helen Ribot"s signature in the lower right-hand corner.
"Caught!" he exclaimed triumphantly, as he turned the page about and held it up before her. "The fell secret of Mervaux revealed to the public at large! Congratulations!"
Helen lowered her head, flushing at this accusing broadside of publicity staring her in the face, while he was as happy as if the picture were his own.
"It"s corking!" he said.
"Yes, the agent liked it, and he has sold others, too," she said, looking up, the magic of the whole business in her eyes. "And they want more. Think of that! And the agent is going to send them to America and thinks that they will sell there!"
It would be false to say that Helen was over set-up with her success; but she was human. Better, that double page was a token of freedom earned and gained. Henceforth, she could be herself.
"Cartoons, too!" she added, when she saw how interested he was. "They particularly want cartoons, some of the editors. I did a series of that old von Stein after I showed the one of you knocking von Eichborn down."
"Good heavens! You----" Would print it, he was going to say, but broke off, for she was laughing in a way that saved him from gulping down the bait.
"But I"m not going to sell any cartoons unless I need to in order to pay the rent. I mean, it spoils the fun I get out of them."
"So we are earning our own living, now," he said. His admiration was transparent. He had earned his and knew what it meant to get a start.
Helen nodded.
"I"ve got forty pounds already to go with the thousand francs. Let"s see, that is almost four hundred dollars in American money! I"m a proud wage-earner and even consider becoming a bloated bond-holder!"
She was smiling and laughing all the time, this changed, this free Helen, still uncousinly, a person apart, and buoyantly happy--until she caught a glimpse of herself in the small panel mirror opposite. Then her features relaxed.
"And you?" she asked, putting out her hand for her book, which she had laid on the seat. "Have you got pa.s.sage back to America yet?"
"No. I----" And he told her briefly what he had done.
With the very announcement, the mirror warning and another warning which sprang from the memory of the scene under the tree at Mervaux were forgotten in the impulse which made her lean across the aisle in pa.s.sionate interest.
"It was like you!" she exclaimed. "The old father and mother at home, what did they say?" She wanted to know all about it. "And Peter Smithers?" she added.
"Not heard from yet," Phil replied. "It"s surprising how you recollect Peter."
"I"d like to make a cartoon of Peter; I don"t know why, for I"ve never heard a dozen sentences about him. And in the artillery! Then you"ll be doing the sort of thing we watched the _soixante-quinze_ doing at Mervaux. And you"re a real sub-lieutenant! Aren"t you proud?"
"Oh, fit to burst!"
"And you will be ordering people about and others will be ordering you about," she continued, returning to the mischievous vein. "I shall have to make another cartoon of how our newest subaltern looked to himself the first time he had on his uniform and how he felt when the general came to inspect his battery for the first time."
Just then it occurred to Helen that she had talked enough; but it had not occurred to her to tell him that she had put her name down on a list which would ensure her wearing a uniform and working in a hospital--she who dreaded the sight of blood. No, this was her business. Now she took up her book again with a sense of relief, and settled well down in the corner of the seat, as if to make herself as small as possible. She held the book well up, her lowered lashes just showing above the cover"s edge.
Phil glanced up from his artillery cramming at times to find her still reading, or, if she were looking away from the page, it was out of the window, unconscious of his presence. At such moments her eyes would open wide as some object interested her vividly, most vividly for an instant, seeing pictures, making pictures, always. A fine n.o.bility about the forehead; indeed, a beautiful forehead, with its rich, dark eyebrows under the crowning glory of the hair that seemed to hold the particles of sunlight that filtered through the gla.s.s, and small, delicately-shaped ears set close to the head. There was more in that head than he had ever guessed. Only a small part of its infinite variety came out of the fingers" ends on to white paper.
Why he did not know, but the scene under the tree came into his mind.
Her abounding sense of humour could not resist the trick when he was making that serious, patternlike lover"s speech which he swore he would never make again in the same way. She had had the best of many jokes on him, whether the irresistible mood of mischief possessed her to make a cartoon or to draw him gazing lovelorn into Henriette"s face. For it had not occurred to him what she thought must be so palpable--the true character of that "Yes," which excoriated her whenever she was with him alone.
He glanced at the drawing on the open page at his side, took it up to look at it again, amazed afresh at its quality and atmospheric reality, and put it down without attracting her attention. She was happy; she had succeeded in the one thing she cared for. It was pleasant to be there opposite her in her triumph on this September day, flying past English hedges, thinking of many things, including the destiny that had sent him to Europe on a holiday to become a soldier; and it was with a touch of regret that he noted a landmark which told him that the train was drawing into Truckleford. She slipped the book back in her bag and the face he saw was that of the plain Helen, singularly dull and lifeless till she drew a sigh and in her eyes appeared a peculiar light, as she explained:
"Here we are at last!"
Mrs. Sanford, as well as the vicar and Henriette, was on the platform to welcome him; but Madame Ribot had found the weather quite too warm for walking. Henriette waved her hand as she smiled her welcome when the train ran past them. The vicar took Phil"s hand in his and held it affectionately in a long clasp; and Mrs. Sanford flushed when he kissed her.
"We are very proud!" she murmured. "But we fear that we have done wrong in not trying to prevent it."
"But his father said "Yes, by Jehovah!"" put in the vicar. He did not tell Phil that he was having that telegram framed to hang under the portrait of the ancestor.
Henriette and Helen were left to follow, as the vicar and his wife took possession of Phil.
"Oh, we"ve heard all about it from Henriette!" said Mrs. Sanford.
"And--and I must confess that what I particularly liked was the way that you knocked that beast of a Prussian down."
"Yes," said the vicar, stiffening out of his usual stoop and stopping.
"But what was it? I am very curious. Er--I boxed a little myself when I was young. Just a straight lead with the right?"
"No," said Phil, turning and holding up his finger at Henriette. "I"ve a bone to pick with you for telling!"
"Later!" she smiled back.
"If not a straight lead with the right, what was it?" persisted the vicar.
"An upper cut to the jaw!" Phil murmured awkwardly.